We're going for a lighter fruity wine this year as part of the experiment of growing the grapes is also experimenting with styles of wine that the grapes can make. The
Monday, October 14, 2013
Leon Millot Crush and Pess 2013
The Leon Millot fro the vineyard in BC were nice this year and after crush the juice was 21 brix and 3.2 ph. Nice parameters for making wine. One thing that is great about this grape is the juice is very highly coloured and after 3 days fermentation on the skin I pressed the must and the wine colour is very dark already. The new wine press from Musca wine supplies worked great.
We're going for a lighter fruity wine this year as part of the experiment of growing the grapes is also experimenting with styles of wine that the grapes can make. The
We're going for a lighter fruity wine this year as part of the experiment of growing the grapes is also experimenting with styles of wine that the grapes can make. The
Monday, October 7, 2013
Evangeline Grape
We've have the Evangeline growing for a few years now and this year we got to see how it performed.
This grape is a cross between Seigerrebe and St. Pepin. It was created in Canada in Nova Scotia and it is as early as Seigerrebe, has the beautiful muscat flavouring but is cold tolerant to about -31c and has some disease resistance to both powdery mildew and downey mildew.
It is very vigorous grower and put up huge canes this year on our vines. The clusters are long and loose and the berries are the biggest of all the varieties we grow - about double the diameter of Marechal Foch.
This variety is the latest to break bud and to flower but among the earliest to ripen. This year it flowered on July 3-4th and we picked them about 65 days later on September 8th at 18 brix and 2.9ph (see it pictured here on Sept 8th). Had to take them before the wasps did. We left a few bunches on the vines and the wasps didn't find them and on October 5th we recorded 21-22 brix and 3.3 ph.
This grape is fantastic, it is already growing (not commercially) in Nova Scotia and should be considered for marginal growing areas like Vancouver Island, south interior BC (West Kootenays) and (East Kootenays) especially where cold winters, short seasons, and late spring frosts are an issue.
This grape is a cross between Seigerrebe and St. Pepin. It was created in Canada in Nova Scotia and it is as early as Seigerrebe, has the beautiful muscat flavouring but is cold tolerant to about -31c and has some disease resistance to both powdery mildew and downey mildew.
It is very vigorous grower and put up huge canes this year on our vines. The clusters are long and loose and the berries are the biggest of all the varieties we grow - about double the diameter of Marechal Foch.
This variety is the latest to break bud and to flower but among the earliest to ripen. This year it flowered on July 3-4th and we picked them about 65 days later on September 8th at 18 brix and 2.9ph (see it pictured here on Sept 8th). Had to take them before the wasps did. We left a few bunches on the vines and the wasps didn't find them and on October 5th we recorded 21-22 brix and 3.3 ph.
This grape is fantastic, it is already growing (not commercially) in Nova Scotia and should be considered for marginal growing areas like Vancouver Island, south interior BC (West Kootenays) and (East Kootenays) especially where cold winters, short seasons, and late spring frosts are an issue.
Great Grape Harvest for 2013
We had a great year for growing this year and despite the 8 week drought in late September to mid-September the vines did great. We had about 1030 C degree days growing.
They have had 5 full growing seasons in the soil now and must have good roots, especially in the Ravat 34 and Leon Millot that have been around the longest.
The wasps were the biggest factor in Harvest and they took virtually all the Lucy Kuhlman and Colmar Precoce Noir. These are among the earliest grapes we have. However, the Evangeline (KW96-2) is really early and we picked it on September 8th at 18brix and 2.9ph as we did not have enough wasp netting to cover them. They are among the the latest to bud out and the latest to flower and the earliest to harvest with giant juicy bunches of grapes. We left a few Evangeline bunches in hopes that the wasps would miss those and then we could see the numbers at full ripeness.
Some of the numbers we got this year harvested Oct 5 as follows;
Variety Brix PH
Leon Millot 22 3.2
Ravat 34 18 3.0
Acadie Blanc 19 3.0
Petite Milo 22 3.1
Evangeline 21 3.3
Castel 22 n/a
Foch 21 n/a
Triompe 21 n/a
They have had 5 full growing seasons in the soil now and must have good roots, especially in the Ravat 34 and Leon Millot that have been around the longest.
The wasps were the biggest factor in Harvest and they took virtually all the Lucy Kuhlman and Colmar Precoce Noir. These are among the earliest grapes we have. However, the Evangeline (KW96-2) is really early and we picked it on September 8th at 18brix and 2.9ph as we did not have enough wasp netting to cover them. They are among the the latest to bud out and the latest to flower and the earliest to harvest with giant juicy bunches of grapes. We left a few Evangeline bunches in hopes that the wasps would miss those and then we could see the numbers at full ripeness.
Some of the numbers we got this year harvested Oct 5 as follows;
Variety Brix PH
Leon Millot 22 3.2
Ravat 34 18 3.0
Acadie Blanc 19 3.0
Petite Milo 22 3.1
Evangeline 21 3.3
Castel 22 n/a
Foch 21 n/a
Triompe 21 n/a