'Iconic vintage’ as wine grape harvest kicks off in Sonoma Valley
August 29, 2023
The moon hung like a lamp in the sky when vineyard manager Brad Kurtz pulled into Gloria Ferrer Caves and Vineyards to kick off Sonoma Valley’s harvest season early Tuesday morning. The Aug. 29 start marked the latest harvest in 41 years of operation at Gloria Ferrer after a cold and damp growing season, a feature which Kurtz is confident will produce one of the finest vintages of sparkling wine since 2000 |
“A year like this, the grapes do all the work,” Kurtz said. “These are ones that are really a throwback vintage, one that we can really appreciate in retrospect in the future.”
Other grapes may struggle, however, with a harvest season that’s more than 20 days behind last year, Kurtz said. Grapes that take longer to mature may experience what growers call a “mercy pick,” harvested as late as possible — even into November — just before rainfall threatens the crop, sometimes before they’re fully matured.
This year represents the 199th official harvest in Sonoma County; winegrapes were first cultivated just miles away at the Mission San Francisco de Solano in 1824.
Steve Sangiacomo, a third-generation partner at Sangiacomo Family Vineyards in Sonoma, called this year a “throwback,” reminiscent of the days before climate change made for more challenging growing seasons.
“We're just gonna have to have the grapes out there a little longer than they have been the last 10 years,” Sangiacomo said. “From a quality standpoint, it's setting up very nicely."
Hopes are always high at the beginning of the season, Kurtz said, but they can dip over the course of a year. “This has not been one of those years,” he said.
After a decade of hotter-than-average seasons occasionally plagued by wildfire smoke, there is a palpable excitement among growers to capture the flavor profile of an old-fashioned growing climate.
“These are the kinds of years you hope for as a sparkling wine grower,” Kurtz added.
Wine weatherAn abnormally cold season sparked one of the latest starts to harvest in nearly two decades, but the 2023 vintage is shaping up to reflect the best of Sonoma Valley if late-season weather doesn’t get in the way.
“From a quality standpoint, it's setting up very nicely. We're just gonna have to have the grapes out there a little longer than they have been the last 10 years,” Sangiacomo said.
“It's almost like a flashback to the past with more of a 2005 vintage,” he said.
The summer growing season lacked the high-temperature heat waves seen in recent years, which is partially responsible for the unseasonably late harvest, said Gloria Ferrer Senior Vice President of Winemaking Harry Hansen, adding that the shift in atmospheric conditions is another symptom of climate change.
“Climate change now isn't just ‘everything gets warmer.’ Sometimes it's just regional variations … This year, it was cold in April, May, June, July.” Hansen said. “I'm not that concerned, because I think the slow maturation of the fruit will lead the more intense flavors.”
But the absence of extreme heat — or even extended above-average temperatures — caused the crops to mature slowly, making the grapes more susceptible to inclement weather over the next eight weeks.
Sparkling winegrapes are harvested first, and there’s less concern in the fields of pinot noir and chardonnay.
But for cabernet, zinfandel, merlot and syrah grapes that take more time to ripen to the necessary level of Brix — a measure of sugar in the fruit — waiting to harvest grapes becomes a balancing act between quality and weather.
“Knock on wood. I mean, they could come any minute,” Sangiacomo said. “We haven't had one of those excessive heat waves, but we have a long way to go between now and the end of harvest. So we were always vulnerable for sure.”
Harvest morningGloria Ferrer’s heritage grapevines lightened under the swift and deft hands of vineyard workers who sliced clusters of grapes from vines in a blur of frenetic motion. Kurtz plucked a grape from one of the vines, plopped it into his mouth and spit out the seed.
“We're going to have really bright acidity, fresh fruit flavors and truly more of a classic sparkling wine style instead of the riper style that we've been getting the last couple of years,” Kurtz said. “When the acids are there, the flavors are there; the mouthfeel and the texture of the wines is going to be there."
At 5:33 a.m. Tuesday, the temperature read 55 degrees. Beams of field lights illuminated the vineyard rows.
“Vamanos!” shouted one of the field hands.
Each worker picked quickly against the rising sun. In minutes, they cleared more than 100 feet of vines.
As the first grapes to be harvested at Gloria Ferrer this year, the heritage grapevines represent four generations of fruit and the best of the winery’s 335 acres of vineyards.
“We call them the Massal selection of pinot,” Kurtz said. “So it's not a clone, it's a field selection that's been taken over multiple generations of vineyards.”
Lights from tractors shined down on rows of vineyards as workers loaded plastic bins with grapes that were headed for the crush pad, where the fruit was processed.
The tops of the heritage vines flung down like octopus arms over the farmworkers.
“We didn't hedge these vines, because we wanted to mark vines for replanting,” Kurtz said. “So we'll actually take cuttings from these vines to replant.”
At 9 a.m., the vineyard workers and the warehouse employees gathered at the top of the estate, circled around three forklift bins filled with violet grapes. Hansen and his management team poured their signature Royal Cuvee wine and delivered a glass to each worker at the vineyard, remarking on the importance to Gloria Ferrer’s Catalonian history.
“These grapes from B Block will probably end up in this blend,” Hansen said pointing to the load of grapes in front of him. “It’s called Royal Cuvee because it was first presented to the king and queen of Spain at a party they threw at their consulate in San Francisco in 1987. They tasted the first vintage there, and we’ve made it every year since.”
The sun had just began drying the dew-covered, sparkling pinot grapes lying before Hansen. Then, as is the eclectic tradition of Sonoma Valley, Hansen wrung the harvest bell and splashed his sparkling wine over the fork-loads of grapes, raising a toast to Kurtz and his colleagues.
“It's early still. But all signs point to this being a really truly iconic vintage a sparkling wine,” Kurtz said. “Mark your calendars for the 2023 vintage.”
Other grapes may struggle, however, with a harvest season that’s more than 20 days behind last year, Kurtz said. Grapes that take longer to mature may experience what growers call a “mercy pick,” harvested as late as possible — even into November — just before rainfall threatens the crop, sometimes before they’re fully matured.
This year represents the 199th official harvest in Sonoma County; winegrapes were first cultivated just miles away at the Mission San Francisco de Solano in 1824.
Steve Sangiacomo, a third-generation partner at Sangiacomo Family Vineyards in Sonoma, called this year a “throwback,” reminiscent of the days before climate change made for more challenging growing seasons.
“We're just gonna have to have the grapes out there a little longer than they have been the last 10 years,” Sangiacomo said. “From a quality standpoint, it's setting up very nicely."
Hopes are always high at the beginning of the season, Kurtz said, but they can dip over the course of a year. “This has not been one of those years,” he said.
After a decade of hotter-than-average seasons occasionally plagued by wildfire smoke, there is a palpable excitement among growers to capture the flavor profile of an old-fashioned growing climate.
“These are the kinds of years you hope for as a sparkling wine grower,” Kurtz added.
Wine weatherAn abnormally cold season sparked one of the latest starts to harvest in nearly two decades, but the 2023 vintage is shaping up to reflect the best of Sonoma Valley if late-season weather doesn’t get in the way.
“From a quality standpoint, it's setting up very nicely. We're just gonna have to have the grapes out there a little longer than they have been the last 10 years,” Sangiacomo said.
“It's almost like a flashback to the past with more of a 2005 vintage,” he said.
The summer growing season lacked the high-temperature heat waves seen in recent years, which is partially responsible for the unseasonably late harvest, said Gloria Ferrer Senior Vice President of Winemaking Harry Hansen, adding that the shift in atmospheric conditions is another symptom of climate change.
“Climate change now isn't just ‘everything gets warmer.’ Sometimes it's just regional variations … This year, it was cold in April, May, June, July.” Hansen said. “I'm not that concerned, because I think the slow maturation of the fruit will lead the more intense flavors.”
But the absence of extreme heat — or even extended above-average temperatures — caused the crops to mature slowly, making the grapes more susceptible to inclement weather over the next eight weeks.
Sparkling winegrapes are harvested first, and there’s less concern in the fields of pinot noir and chardonnay.
But for cabernet, zinfandel, merlot and syrah grapes that take more time to ripen to the necessary level of Brix — a measure of sugar in the fruit — waiting to harvest grapes becomes a balancing act between quality and weather.
“Knock on wood. I mean, they could come any minute,” Sangiacomo said. “We haven't had one of those excessive heat waves, but we have a long way to go between now and the end of harvest. So we were always vulnerable for sure.”
Harvest morningGloria Ferrer’s heritage grapevines lightened under the swift and deft hands of vineyard workers who sliced clusters of grapes from vines in a blur of frenetic motion. Kurtz plucked a grape from one of the vines, plopped it into his mouth and spit out the seed.
“We're going to have really bright acidity, fresh fruit flavors and truly more of a classic sparkling wine style instead of the riper style that we've been getting the last couple of years,” Kurtz said. “When the acids are there, the flavors are there; the mouthfeel and the texture of the wines is going to be there."
At 5:33 a.m. Tuesday, the temperature read 55 degrees. Beams of field lights illuminated the vineyard rows.
“Vamanos!” shouted one of the field hands.
Each worker picked quickly against the rising sun. In minutes, they cleared more than 100 feet of vines.
As the first grapes to be harvested at Gloria Ferrer this year, the heritage grapevines represent four generations of fruit and the best of the winery’s 335 acres of vineyards.
“We call them the Massal selection of pinot,” Kurtz said. “So it's not a clone, it's a field selection that's been taken over multiple generations of vineyards.”
Lights from tractors shined down on rows of vineyards as workers loaded plastic bins with grapes that were headed for the crush pad, where the fruit was processed.
The tops of the heritage vines flung down like octopus arms over the farmworkers.
“We didn't hedge these vines, because we wanted to mark vines for replanting,” Kurtz said. “So we'll actually take cuttings from these vines to replant.”
At 9 a.m., the vineyard workers and the warehouse employees gathered at the top of the estate, circled around three forklift bins filled with violet grapes. Hansen and his management team poured their signature Royal Cuvee wine and delivered a glass to each worker at the vineyard, remarking on the importance to Gloria Ferrer’s Catalonian history.
“These grapes from B Block will probably end up in this blend,” Hansen said pointing to the load of grapes in front of him. “It’s called Royal Cuvee because it was first presented to the king and queen of Spain at a party they threw at their consulate in San Francisco in 1987. They tasted the first vintage there, and we’ve made it every year since.”
The sun had just began drying the dew-covered, sparkling pinot grapes lying before Hansen. Then, as is the eclectic tradition of Sonoma Valley, Hansen wrung the harvest bell and splashed his sparkling wine over the fork-loads of grapes, raising a toast to Kurtz and his colleagues.
“It's early still. But all signs point to this being a really truly iconic vintage a sparkling wine,” Kurtz said. “Mark your calendars for the 2023 vintage.”
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