Vineyard Diary

We harvested our Petit Verdot from Argyle Vineyards on October 5, 2006. Thankfully, the weather gods were beneficent during our harvest, though we had some heavy rain overnight. We were not nervous of damage to fruit or vines during harvest, nor was safety a real concern - we were mostly concerned about the possibility of those picking bins filling with water - so we had plenty of tarps on standby!

Fortunately, we did not need them, and harvest went smoothly (although you can see the ominous clouds hovering with malice aforethought!). We picked some 24 tons of fruit which came in @ 24.8 brix at the winery, and the TA and pH parameters look fantastic too, so we're very excited about this vintage.

This will be our second Petit Verdot bottling - we are about to bottle our 2004 Petit Verdot, also from Argyle Vineyards, and it seems that we may have found yet another varietal that is unique not only within the San Antonio Valley (our Zinfandel is being received very favorably), but within Monterey County and California as a whole.

Click on the image to see the full size version, and to explore Escafeld's other photo's on the Flickr site. Alternatively, you may click here to explore more Petit Verdot harvest photo's.

Steve Wetherill
Escafeld Vineyards