Rob’s Vineyard Update and Random Mythology Lesson
Tuesday, February 9th, 2010
We continue to prune all day, and have finished more than sixty percent since the start of the year. Pruning is a dialogue with both the past and the future. By cutting away and reforming each vine, we’re working with those who did the work before. By thinking of the work to be done in the future, we’re making decisions to facilitatethe work of growing future vintage’s wines.
Ours is a vineyard not grafted to American rootstalks, which makes for both challenges and opportunities. One of the most amazing things about working with ungrafted grapevines is the ability to propagate a new vine by “layering” a new vine in. That is, we select and grow a long cane during the previous year, and once pruned, we bury it in a way that it’s still connected to the mother vine and growing towards and up into a new vine position. The cane will begin to self-root in a matter of days. Within a year, we’ll have established the production of two vines where once we had just one. In another year, we’ll cut the new vine away from the mother vine, thus making two distinct vines.
February 14 isn’t just St. Valentine’s day, but is also another wine Saint’s day, that of St. Trifon the Pruner, patron saint of wine growers. Celebrated mostly in Bulgaria, at the end of the day the women join the men who’ve been pruning all day to feast and dance. So next Sunday, there are two saints who would very much like you to drink some pinot and celebrate wine and love.
