Crazy season at Sampson Valley Vineyard

 Another season at Sampson Valley Vineyard has come to an end.  

We were more than a little worried after getting over 15 inches of rain from mid May to mid July.  But a long dry fall has come to the rescue.  As of today (October 26), we still haven't had a hard killing frost!  In all the years I lived in Sampson I don't recall ever having a frost this late.  A lovely by product of this is that the vines are able to show off their beautiful colors. Usually the first frost is around Oct 1 while the vines are still green, but this year they have turned a lovely yellow and orange.

Our last harvests, just last Saturday, were for our late harvest wines.  This year they made it to an incredible 28.5 brix!  Look for these to be released from Odilon Ford Winery in early spring.  In addition to our red Fallstreak (made from Frontenac), we will also have a brand new Fallstreak Blanc, made from our Frontenac Blanc grapes.

By the way this wine's name comes from Fallstreak clouds.

A big thank you to everyone who came out to help with the harvest, this year.  Every weekend the weather was incredible. And the people that came out to help were absolutely incredible.  Cheers!

New Wine release from Odilon Ford Winery: Introducing Noctilucent Ice Wine!

 Another new release from Odilon Ford Winery!  Noctilucent Ice Wine.

In the crisp air of November 2019, under the radiant glow of a full moon, we embarked on a unique journey at Sampson Valley Vineyard. Our dedicated team, including my sister, niece and nephew, braved the chilly 12ºF night (later droping to 9ºF), equipped with headlamps, to handpick the finest grapes for our special Ice Wine.

🌱 Harvested by Moonlight: The magic began as the moon rose over our vineyards, illuminating our path to select the perfect grapes, frozen naturally on the vine. This crucial step, essential for authentic Ice Wine, imbues our wine with its unique sweetness and concentrated flavors.

🔬 A Measure of Sweetness: Our initial refractometer reading showed a remarkable 46.9 brix, indicating the high sugar concentration in our grapes. After meticulous pressing throughout the night, the composite brix remained impressively over 40, a testament to the quality of our harvest.

❄️ From Grape to Ice Block: The journey from grape to wine is a marvel. After pressing, the remnants formed a stunning grape ice block - a visual representation of our dedication and the cold conditions required for Ice Wine production.

🍷 The Art of Fermentation: Our Ice Wine, Noctilucent, named after the mesmerizing, rare upper mesospheric clouds that illuminate the night sky, underwent a natural fermentation process. Using wild yeast, it matured gracefully over three years, reaching 10% alcohol while maintaining over 20 brix in residual sugar.

🌌 Inspired by Nature's Beauty: Just as noctilucent clouds are a rare and beautiful phenomenon, our Ice Wine captures this essence in a bottle. These clouds, among the coldest and rarest in our atmosphere, mirror the exclusivity and charm of our Noctilucent Ice Wine.

🥂 Taste the Elegance: We are thrilled to share the final masterpiece with you - a bottle of Noctilucent Ice Wine, embodying the purity and essence of that magical night.

Join us in celebrating this remarkable creation. Experience the taste of the moonlit night, captured in every sip of Odilon Ford's Noctilucent Ice Wine.

Dry and early start to the Season

 

It's been an early start to the season.  Bud break was in the first week of May (about a week earlier than average, and 2nd earliest in 18 years.   The vines are happy and healthy with very little disease pressure due to the dry weather.   Bloom completed by June 19, and even the Rose Chafer pressure was lower than in the past.

We have not used any Round Up/herbicide for over 5 years, so the drier weather has helped us keep down the grass and weeds beneath the vines, but I think even the mature vines could use a drink.   We also planted a small block of Itasca this year, so we are having to give those little guys a drink fairly often in this dry weather using buckets and hoses where they reach.

Crop load looks very high this year.   I think the vines went into the winter in the best condition in years after an excellent weather year in 2020.   The 2020 vintage while small, was perhaps the best quality since 2012.  By the way the 2020 Wisecco Rosé and 2020 Pet Nats are in high demand, so if you want to get your hands on one, order soon.

Very late Friday night, my son and I were out in the vineyard trying to capture some astrophotography pictures over the vineyard using my cheap smart phone.  It's amazing what these little devices can do, check out the pictures below.  There were no enhancements, or recoloring by me, just using the default astrophotography settings.

Cheers,

Jerrold

A Rose Chafer by any other name ... (would be just as bad)

Sampson Valley Vineyard,  Frontenac Blanc block on June 13, 2020

We are in growing year 18!   The vineyard is as active as ever.   We have made lots of changes in our practices since the first planting 17 years ago.

 We are at about 3 acres in size now.  Most of our grapes are Frontenac Blanc, LaCrescent, and Petite Pearl, but there several other cultivars as well.  Including LaCrosse, St Pepin, Prairie Star, Frontenac and Marquette.

We have changed our training practices and trellis a few times.  We went from Top Wire High Cordon, to VSP (vertical Shoot position), and now back to high cordon.  We are now using a modified HBrace trellis for the newer vines.

We have completely eliminated glyphosate (RoundUp) about 5 years ago. Some of the motivation for this were studies in California that have found glyphosate in wine (although probably harmless), I thought we can eliminate it.  In doing so, we have significantly added more labor into our grape production.

Right now we under the annual attack of Rose Chafers.   Since they come out during grape blossom, they are very difficult to control.  (sprays ... even some organic sprays could affect honey bees)  The most safe and effective control is manual removal.  So for the last week, we have been removing rose chafers by hand!

Some of our changes over the years have added a lot of cost, but we want any wine made from our grapes to be grown in an environmentally sustainable way.   These changes add to the price of the final product, but we think it is worth every penny.

Cheers,

Jerrold

Another year at Sampson Valley Vineyard

Sampson Valley Vineyard on July 8, 2018

It has been a while since the blog has been updated, but things are going very well at Sampson Valley Vineyard.

We are currently at 3 acres of vines.   Our newest vines are Petite Pearl and Frontenac Blanc.   They are already in their 5th year, and should both have a nice crop this year.

Frontenac Blanc

2 years ago we started Odilon Ford Winery.  So now all of Sampson Valley Vineyard's grapes now go to Odilon Ford Winery to make sparkling wines! (and a couple of non sparkling wines).

We have a few other updates as well. 

• We have been moving to single high cordon for our grape vine training from Vertical Shoot Positioning (... aka VSP).  About 2/3 of the vineyard is now single high cordon.  Research shows it tends to provide larger crops, requiring less labor, with no significant quality impact compared to VSP.
• We are no longer using any glyphosate (RoundUp) under the vines (or anywhere in the vineyard.)   It is a little more work to maintain, but eliminating, a likely, unnecessary pesticide is a good thing.
• We are removing Rose Chafers by hand!   My nieces removed 10s of thousands of Rose Chafers by hand this year.   They shook them off onto tarps, used hand held vacuums, and squashed them individually.   Last year these critters (along with grape flea beetles) wiped out almost my entire crop.   This year with a lot of work, the grapes were mostly spared.

After a crazy spring, (30+inches of snow in April), we have had excellent weather in the vineyard.   Disease pressure is the lowest I have seen in several years.  Grapes are a little behind this year,  I expect harvest to be in late September, or early October.

If you are interested in trying out our sparkling wines, they are available online!

Cheers.

One of the reasons Harvest is later than usual this year

This picture kind of says it all.   For the first 8 months of 2014 the coldest anomaly on the planet is over Wisconsin.

At the same time, it is a bit scarey how much red and pink there is, and how little blue is on that image.

Now this is what I like to see two weeks before harvest!

That doesn't look good....

A lot of rain is predicted over the next 5-7 days.

updated (precip from Aug 23- Sept 22 2014)

That is not something you want to see at this time of the year.   This may cause berry splitting, and other damage.   

Congratulations to Leigh's Garden Winery!

Leigh's Garden Winery Logo

Leigh's Garden Winery went 5 for 5 at the 6th International Cold Climate Wine Competition.   A very prestigious honor!  http://mgga.publishpath.com/competition

Sampson Valley Vineyard is proud to say it provided Leigh with many of the grapes in his wines.

Cheers!

Veraison almost complete, first somerset seedless grapes

Somerset Seedless

Veraison started about when predicted, and is nearly complete.   Marquette began veraison on Monday, August 11, and was 95% complete by August 16.   Frontenac was 50% done by August 16.

Marquette

Harvest is now anticipated to begin the first weekend of October.

A random cluster was left behind on the two year old somerset seedless.    Beautiful looking grape!   After tasting a few berries, it is probably only a week or so from being able to be harvested.   Good to know for future years!   I did notice a slight residual seed, but not too much.   It already has a nice taste.   I heard rumors that it makes a decent wine ....... hmmmm?

2014 Bloom has begun

Frontenac and Prairie Star have begun to bloom. ( Unfortunately Rose chafers have emerged too.) This puts us about 2 or 3 days ahead of last year.   Bloom has been one of the best early indicators for predicting harvest date.   Based on bloom, I think harvest will occur no earlier than the last weekend in September for LaCrescent, and Prairie Star.    The next two weeks I would likely plan on picking Marquette and Frontenac.  Weather during the season can still shift those dates later, but earlier dates are unlikely.  Crop loads look high right now, so I may need to do some crop thinning.    We are seeing almost zero bud loss on LaCrescent, Marquette, Prairie Star and Frontenac.    Foch is the only cultivar that had significant damage, It looks like 50-80% primary bud loss.    

2014 Bud break

As expected bud break is later than average this year.   Somewhat surprisingly, this date is not that unusual.  Below is a table of bud break dates at Sampson Valley Vineyard over the last 9 years.

Growing Year	Date of bud break	GDD at Bud break *
2014	5/21/2014	111
2013	5/17/2013	132
2012	5/6/2012	193
2011	5/21/2011	101
2010	5/3/2010	133
2009	5/22/2009	-NA-
2008	5/22/2008	-NA-
2007	5/4/2007	-NA-
2006	5/4/2006	-NA-

* base 50, GDD since April 1.

Note that the bud break average date is May 13.   Average GDD at bud break is 134.   So bud break this year is only about a week behind the 9 year average.

Based on forecasted temperatures and average temperatures after the extended forecast period, bloom is estimated to begin on June 18.

So far most vines look like they survived the severe winter quite well.   The one notable exception so far is foch.    Looking at the foch buds during pruning, we were seeing significant bud damage.   We are seeing good bud growth now, so hopefully there was no major trunk or vine vascular damage.

Baby it's cold outside .... or will be.

We are expecting the coldest temperatures my vineyard has ever seen over the next several days.   Highs on Monday and Tuesday may not get out of the minus teens Fahrenheit. Low temperatures will approach -20° F to -25° F (-29° C to -32° C).

NWS forecast

Mon Jan 6 forecast from NWS on Friday Jan3.

 While most of the grape cultivars I have planted should be okay, some will be on the edge of having some damage.

Below is a table of cultivars I grow, and the listed "hardiness temperature".  Hardiness temperatures are from this page.

Cultivar	Hardiness Temperature
Foch	-25° F / -32° C
Frontenac	-35° F / -37° C
Marquette	-35° F / -37° C
PetitePearl* (non producing)	-32° F / -35° C
LaCrosse	-25° F / -32° C
St Pepin	-26° F / -32° C
LaCressent	-36° F / -38° C
Prairie Star	-40° F / -40° C
Frontenac Blanc * (non producing)	-38° F / -39° C
Seedless Concord*	-25° F / -32° C
Somerset Seedless (non producing)	-30° F / -34° C

*The source for the hardiness temperatures for these varieties were found elsewhere.

Several things will determine how my vines pull through.  Including but not limited to:

• Grape cultivar.  (obvious one, some vines are genetically better adapted to surviving cold.)
• health of vine going into dormancy ( a sick weak vine will not be able to tolerate cold as well.)
• age of vine   (younger trunks and cordons may be injured, and may need to be trained up from the roots.)
• temperatures/weather immediately proceeding severe cold.   (Warm temperatures immediately preceding cold will de-acclimate the vine, and make vine more susceptible to damage. )
• severity, and duration of the cold weather (another obvious one)
• previous years crop load  (vine puts too much energy into ripening crop load, and may not store enough energy to come out of dormancy well in spring)
• harvest time  ( a late harvest does not give the vine much time to put energy away before dormancy)

Of these factors,  harvest time and crop load last year may be impact my vines the most.   Crossing my fingers that everything goes fine.

First ice wine grape harvest at Sampson Valley Vineyard

Ice wine grapes Thanksgiving 2013

Early Thanksgiving morning (11/28), while the temperatures hovered in the upper teens and low 20s, I harvest about 125 lbs of ice wine grapes.   This is the first ice wine grape harvest in the ten year history of the vineyard.    It was an experiment, (somewhat forced).   The grapes looked beautiful.    In this round of harvest, I picked primarily st pepin which I still had netted.   They were about 20 brix at the end of the growing season, but came in at about 29.5 after crush and press when I picked them for the ice wine.   There is about another 400 lbs of lacrosse, but unnetted.   But even though they are not under nets, they look good.

Cold calm day at Sampson Valley Vineyard

Lacrosse grapes

Since I was harvesting for myself, and not a commercial winery, I processed them too.    I was not entirely sure of the whole process, but was somewhat limited by the equipment that I had.   Since the temperatures were not in the single digits, the grapes were more of a snow cone/milk shake consistency, not hard marbles, like many ice wine makers deal with.   This was probably a good thing, since my crusher-destemmer and wood basket press would probably not have worked.

 I easily picked 125 lbs in about an hour (3 lugs full).   I probably could have picked a lot more, but had to get back for Thanksgiving dinner at 3:00.

St Pepin grapes

A very friendly black and white cat came out to help.... it hung out the entire time I was picking.   It even climbed a trellis pole to get a better view.   Maybe he was guarding the grapes for the last couple of months?   I probably didn't need the net!

St Pepin grapes with their guardian cat

Ready to pounce?

Crushing went slowly, and the destemmer sieve got pretty caked with the frozen must.   Unfortunately, the picture is slightly blurry and doesn't do the golden must justice.   Very little juice was visible as I crushed.

Thick ice wine slurry/must

Must before pressing.   Just a bit of juice after crushing.

At the end of pressing, I had a total of 3 gallons of very sweet juice.  The taste was wonderful!   Juice yield was probably a bit higher than it should have been.   I attribute that to the temperatures warming to the low 20s as I crushed and pressed.

I added a bit of potassium metabisulfite, and let the juice sit until Saturday morning.   I inoculated the juice with KV-1116 yeast.   Fermentation started slowly, but is now humming along well.   I plan to pull about 1/2 gallon of wine out early before fermentation is complete, and bottle it in small sparkling wine bottles, and try to make a sparkling ice wine.   The rest will be a more traditional ice wine.

There are another 400-500 lbs still in the field, and if I don't sell them, hopefully I will be able to pick them while they are still prime.

This will definitely become an annual tradition!

2013 harvest round 1 ... done

Picking Marquette grapes at Sampson Valley Vineyard
September 28, 2013

What a great day for a harvest! ....  What a spectacular turnout!  ....   The harvest party at Sampson Valley Vineyard was  incredible this year.    We harvested over 6,500 lbs in about 7 hours.   The weather was almost perfect.  We worked like crazy, and got a lot done.

Most of the grapes were taken by Leigh's Garden Winery, and some by Vines and Rushes Winery.   Definitely check out these two wineries.   Top notch wines and great people.

We still have to harvest Frontenac for Leigh's Garden Winery on Saturday, Oct 12.   The rest of the grapes are destined for home winemakers, and maybe a few for myself.

I added a bunch of other pictures from the weekend below.