Vintage 2016

[n4sir]

Philip White's early comments on what is looking to be another early vintage:

drinkster.com
06 January 2016
EARLY HARVEST: 2016 STARTED IN 2015

http://drinkster.blogspot.com/2016/01/e ... -2015.html

Welcome back. While you were away drinking - I trust it was good - something very interesting occurred. 2016 nearly happened in 2015.

In Australia, the 2016 vintage has come very close to starting in 2015. For some in the warmest regions, it probably did. They'll stay schtum.

While harvest has well-and-truly commenced in some parts of the irrigated Murray-Darling Basin, record vintage rains in the sub-tropical Hunter have dramatically slowed its ripening and picking. Not only does ripening reverse as the vines take a huge drink, but the vineyards with looser soils become muddy and impassable for human pickers and machines.

In the major profit-making regions of Barossa and McLaren Vale, the record-breaking pre-Christmas heatwave came close to making 2016 the earliest vintage yet. What prevented that, or has prevented it so far, was the tendency for vines to close down their metabolism in extreme heat.

Reports of the earliest veraison known in Barossa and McLaren Vale began trickling in from rattled growers in mid-December. Even in the cool Yarra Valley some Pinot vines were colouring-up at Christmas.

[Chris H]

Yep, even the somewhat cooler regions like the Yarra Valley will pick really early this year. Not good for elegance and refinement.

[Scotty vino]

Just cruising thru the hills on the deadly I noticed Ashton hills vineyards seem very advanced like last year.

[Ozzie W]

I've visited a few wineries in the Mornington Peninsula during the past week while away on holidays, but I haven't seen any veraison yet. Not far away though by the sound of it.

[Hunter]

Ripening way too fast. I've been eating ripe
grapes from thr vinyard next too our restaurant straight from the vine
" there's always next year "
Another concentrated blockbuster ..

[Sean]

deleted

[swirler]

Sean, I didn't realise it was so humid until I checked. 75% is positively tropical for Melbourne. It's usually 50-60%. No wonder it's some people are giving off very impolite odours!

Maybe we can plant some semillon here

[mjs]

Just cruising thru the hills on the deadly I noticed Ashton hills vineyards seem very advanced like last year.

I'm impressed, its not called Ashton "Hills" for nothing, the road outside is challenging on two wheels

[Scotty vino]

Just cruising thru the hills on the deadly I noticed Ashton hills vineyards seem very advanced like last year.

I'm impressed, its not called Ashton "Hills" for nothing, the road outside is challenging on two wheels

ahh yes Tregarthen rd. The fastest I've ever been on a bike and the slowest.
Lovely part of the world.

[Rory]

Verasion has started in places on the Peninsula, some netting going on already.

[phillisc]

Yes great effort Scotty, Moira (Sparky the triathlete) would be pleased.
My car has trouble getting up that hill and appreciative that I can swing into Stephen George's without the thought of a dreaded hill start.

From one bike rider to another, I am just sticking with the flats of Adelaide at present...need to get much fitter and would help being 20+ years younger.

Cheers
Craig

[mjs]

Craig,

I am sure we could all benefit from a 20yr reduction in age!! haha

(not applicable to wine of course!)

cheers, Malcolm

[Scotty vino]

Yes great effort Scotty, Moira (Sparky the triathlete) would be pleased.
My car has trouble getting up that hill and appreciative that I can swing into Stephen George's without the thought of a dreaded hill start.

From one bike rider to another, I am just sticking with the flats of Adelaide at present...need to get much fitter and would help being 20+ years younger.

Cheers
Craig

I'm in the hills 2-3 times a week training for the dreaded Bupa TDU ride.
Also gives me a chance to unwind and checkout the vineyards in the hills.
Never a bad view. Woods Hill Rd near Ashton is one of my favourite spots.
The vineyards thru there look amazing this time of year.

[Panda 9D]

A Barossa winemaker I spoke to said it seems to be similar to last year but he is expecting higher yields. He said his biodynamic vineyard is holding on the best.

[n4sir]

Vintage 2016: South Australian wine grape growers gear up for harvest
ABC Rural
19 January 2016
SA Rural Reporters

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-01-19/s ... s_adelaide

South Australia's multi-million dollar wine industry is gearing up for another strong vintage, with early season grapes already trickling into the state's wineries. As the nation's largest wine producer, South Australia contributes more than half of the country's annual wine volume, a commodity worth an estimated $440 million last season.

ABC Rural takes a look at the key issues and crop predictions across four of the state's key wine growing areas.

Riverland: Mixed fortunes for bulk wine producers

Hot and dry conditions have brought on a slightly early harvest in Australia's biggest wine producing region, where crop performance has been mixed. Small volumes of grapes are already being trucked into Riverland wineries, with picking expected to ramp up later this week. The industry as a whole remains on track for an average season, but within individual vineyards, performance has largely been determined by access to water. Growers who have been in a position to irrigate through the hot weather are faring well, but those who've struggled to keep the pumps going are reporting below average yields.

Despite the challenges, excitement is building as growers and wineries gear up for their busiest time of the year. Contract harvester Tony Richards said he's expecting a condensed picking season. "Everything seems to have ripened early this year," Mr Richards said. "We like it to be ten weeks normally, to give us time to get through it without trying to kill ourselves too much. "The quickest year we've done is eight weeks, and that was really hard work, so we're just worried it might be there again."

Adelaide Hills: A beautiful crop ready to pick

The 2016 vintage is going to be fantastic. That's how president of the Adelaide Hills Wine Region and The Pawn Wine Company's Tom Keelan has summed up the season.

"This year is shaping up to be such a beautiful vintage being so dry leading into it, the ripening period has been quite nicely drawn out." He said water was a major issue for Hills growers this year, but with good management, the season is expected to pay off for many. "Having such a dry winter and spring is really coming home to roost I suppose, where the vines just don't have that sub surface moisture there," he said. "So that supplementary irrigation is becoming such a critical part of making sure these grapes get across the line in the coming few weeks.

"Blocks further north in the hills are not far from being picked. "Further south down towards Macclesfield and Kuitpo, they're probably having an average time in terms of timing, we'll probably be harvesting there in four to five weeks."

Coonawarra: Growers welcome drought-intensified flavours

In the state's south-east, drought conditions are continuing to bite throughout the Coonawarra. While the prolonged dry has caused heartache for many primary producers, its been a different story for grape growers.

Winemaker Bryan Tonkin predicted the dry weather would help produce strong and concentrated flavours in the 2016 crop. "This year's vintage will be characterised by the long, dry period up to fruit development, which has seen us develop some really small berries on the bunches," he said. "I think this will give us some quite concentrated flavours. "Chardonnay development this year will be quite intense, and that will allow us to do everything from sparkling bases through to our heavily oaked chardonnays. "Not a lot of rain allows for good fruit set, because there's no rain to interrupt with the pollination. "It also reduces the amount of disease pressure within the vineyards."

Clare Valley: On-track for an early harvest start

Winemakers in the Clare Valley have also seen their season shift forward because of hot and dry conditions across the valley. Vineyard manager with Taylors Wines in the Clare Valley, Colin Hinze, said low rainfall during winter and spring had also contributed to the grapes ripening sooner than expected. "If we start our rainfall accumulation from May, the winter and spring accumulation has been a bit low and I think that's contributing to the season being quite early," Mr Hinze said.

Access to supplementary water from the Murray River under a three year trial with SA Water has given the company a cheaper and cleaner irrigation source this year. Mr Hinze said the grapes have been through the veraison period, where the berries become softer and start to develop more sugar before producing full bodies wine grapes. Based on that growing schedule, the grapes will be ready for harvest by the end of January, uncharacteristically early for the Clare Valley.

[n4sir]

Drinkster.com
10 February 2016
VINTAGE 16 ROLLS RIGHT ON IN
By Philip White

http://drinkster.blogspot.com/2016/02/v ... on-in.html

We'd had that horrid, unnatural-feeling record heatwave in December, and vignerons along the big inland rivers had commenced their vintage the year before its calendar number came up. Even famously cool places like the Yarra Valley were facing their earliest harvest yet. But suddenly it was wet and windy. In some places, depending on the style of vineyard, its ground and its husbandry, the parched vines were gulping up the rain and berries were gorging and splitting. Add the marauding moulds that humidity brings to such exposed wet sugar and few growers felt confident about 2016.

But in my neck of the woods at least, McLaren Vale, the Fleurieu and its South Mount Lofty Ranges, the thundery rains seemed always followed by solid gusty winds which dried wet canopies quickly: winds not wild enough to damage the netting, but strong enough to penetrate the leaves and bunches and make fungicides unnecessary...

[mjs]

Ian,
I know my brother in the Hills wasn't too concerned about the rains from a couple of weeks ago. He's still a little way off yet. Mind you, he's got good drainage and not terribly rich soils. Reasonably confident of a pretty good vintage at this stage.
cheers, Malcolm

[Scotty vino]

Vines were looking good at pennies mag es and the new entrance is finished by the look.
Out and about on the deadly...

PENS.jpg

[Rory]

Mornington Peninsula still looks very good to excellent, although it too will be a very early vintage.

[swirler]

Pinot in Mornington to be picked in early March from what I've heard.

[n4sir]

Penfolds Magill Estate was picked last Thursday and Friday (February 11th and 12th), another early vintage (and a small one going by the number of barrels I saw to be filled).

I got some snaps today of a couple of the ferments in progress: Marybank is a another relatively local block, near Morialta - not sure where that one will end up in, maybe St Henri?

[sjw_11]

Comments from Dalwhinnie in a members email:

"Well first of all vintage 2016 has been intense and rapid. In the last week and a half our vineyard team have hand-picked all of the Dalwhinnie vineyard. Our yields have been reduced by 30% with the drought conditions of 2015, but the good news is that the quality of the fruit so far looks outstanding. We will complete vintage by the end of February 2016, the earliest on record. The seasons are more extreme and more unpredictable, challenging times indeed."

[sjw_11]

And Craiglee:

"We began picking on Friday with the old block of Chardonnay - nearly a month earlier than last year. The fruit looks great, and the flavour is wonderful .
We will take the first of the shiraz off before the end of February, something that has never happened before here. The daytime heat and the mild overnight temperatures are certainly contributing to make this a challenging season, and are testament to a changing climatic environment."

[marsalla]

http://www.riverlandwine.com.au/news-an ... erway.html

[Matt@5453]

Interesting comments mentioned in the above posts:
“The seasons are more extreme and more unpredictable, challenging times indeed."
“are testament to a changing climatic environment."
These are common themes I hear around a lot of winemakers and other agricultural industries. Extreme heat, rain at the completely wrong times, long dry spells and hail have played havoc at times.

In the Clare Valley vintage is moving along, its early, but that is the way it has been trending, its like the 'goal posts' have been moved forward.
Most Riesling is off as are other whites like Chardonnay, Fiano, Vermentino, Pinot Gris, and Semillon etc. Early reds like Tempranillo are done. Shiraz is coming off in ‘spurts’. The initial expectation was that vintage has going to be hot and the wineries hit with a wall of fruit similar to 2008, but over the last couple of weeks we’ve had some cooler weather during the day including nights down to 10-11 degrees which is slowing things down a bit at the moment, some are reporting Baumes are actually going backwards at the moment.
Some of the dry grown vineyards are really suffering from the lack of rainfall for the entire season and are just hanging on. I go past Wendouree frequently, the vines look good considering no irrigation.
Amongst the variability that occurs through the entire valley, overall yields are up on previous years and quality is looking very good, with the fine weather set to continue the reds should ripen up nicely.

[Gavin Trott]

Will let you all know next Wednesday!

Well, not quite official vintage report, but will be doing some grapepicking at/for Roger at Marius Wines, so will get a 'first hand' idea of one little part of vintage 2016 myself.

Roger, himself, seems pretty pleased, at this stage, so ???.
.

[qwertt]

"Roger, himself, seems pretty pleased, at this stage, so ???.”

If Roger is pleased, then I’m very pleased!

[Rory]

Update on the Mornington Peninsula is that the lower areas have picked most fruit, upper levels most of the whites, some of the reds. Either way, most winemakers I've spoken to are cautiously highly optimistic. Colours, sugars, flavours and tannins are all looking to be nigh on exceptional.

[n4sir]

West Australian wine industry begins harvest after mixed growing season
WA Country Hour
By Bridget Fitzgerald
16 Feb 2016

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-02-15/v ... er/7168862

Harvest for the 2016 vintage is underway in Western Australia with producers grateful for strong finish to the growing season.

Winemakers say recent hot weather across the south west of the state has been a gift, after heavy rains threatened the start to harvest.

The heavy rain that fell in mid-January had the potential to disrupt quality and could have created pest issues, just as many vineyards were about to start picking.

But a recent heatwave has helped improve vineyard conditions and has even brought on a particularly early start to harvest, according to some winemakers.

Margaret River winemaker Virginia Willcock said she began harvesting white varieties at the end of January, which according to her was a relatively early start to the season.

Ms Willcock said she started picking Chardonnay and also small quantities of Sauvignon Blanc, which was "really unusual".

"But the sugars and the pH is starting to come up," she said.

"And the flavours are fantastic, so you've just got to pick it."

According to Ms Willcock the January rainfall was not welcome, but it arrived with enough time for issues to clear up before harvest began in earnest.

"The reds were only just starting to change colour, so it was a beautiful little drink while they were undergoing an intense change," she said.

"The whites, it will probably dilute some a little bit and it did put a bit of disease pressure on.

"But the beauty was the following weather dried everything out, sun came out and disease pressure was taken off."

Ms Willcock said she expected fruit quality to result in "quite a high acid year", which would create "quite crisp wines".

But she said that was a positive outcome because crisp, acidic wines were popular.

Rain timing key in lead up to ripening

To the north of Margaret River, Boyanup producers Julie and Phil Hutton are still several weeks away from harvesting their merlot grapes.

Mr Hutton said they were lucky they had only just started the ripening period, known as veraison, when the heavy rains hit in January, as any later and the wet weather would have had a more damaging effect on the fruit.

According to him their vines have actually benefited from water that has soaked through after that rain event.

"We haven't irrigated [the vines] since and it looks like it will be a fair while before we need to again," he said.

While rainfall had the potential to affect fruit quality, given the red varieties were further away from harvest, Mr Hutton did not anticipate quality issues.

Ms Hutton said they expect to begin harvest in the first week of March, which she said was consistent with previous years.

"The longer we keep the fruit on the vines, the more chance it has for the flavours to develop," she said.

"But we don't want the sugars going through the roof, which we don't want — you've got to get that balance."

[n4sir]

Hunter winemakers wrap up vintage after one of wettest summers on record
1233 ABC Newcastle
Posted 1 March 2016 at 7:20am

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-03-01/h ... s-/7209394

Hunter Valley winemakers have been battling to get the last of their grapes off the vine after a heat wave threatened to impact the quality of the fruit.

After a turbulent start to harvest with consistently wet weather, Hunter vignerons have finally wrapped up their annual pick.

There was concern heavy rain in January would wipe out much of the vintage, but a spike in temperatures in February allowed some last minute ripening of the grapes.

Hunter Valley Wine and Tourism Association vice president Andrew Margan said it had not been smooth sailing for all vineyards, but he was confident of a good result.

"The vineyards that were either affected by the hail or more affected by the rain, some of them failed completely," he said.

"But those vines that hung in there through that rain, the red wine in particular is outstanding."

Mr Margan said it had been a year of challenges.

"Last Thursday we got to 42 degrees Celsius and that really made things spike in terms of sugar levels so we've been pretty busy getting things off since then," he said.

"There wouldn't be too many grapes left around the valley, that's for sure."

The Hunter was hit by an east coast low in January, causing widespread floods and contributing to one of the region's wettest summers on record.

The flooding around Raymond Terrace and through the lower valley forced evacuations and cut off some communities for days.

Weatherzone meteorologist Rob Sharpe said it led to some startling rainfall figures.

"Newcastle picked up 534 millimetres compared to its average of only 278 millimetres which makes it the eighth wettest summer in over 150 years of records," he said.

"It's also likely to be about the seventh or eighth warmest summer on record for Newcastle."

But Mr Sharpe said apart from the floods earlier this year, there was not too much out of the ordinary for summer.

"If you took those figures out then it would actually be near average summer in terms of rainfall or a little bit drier than average," he said.