Esmonin Elucidation

[Unknown]

That 88 is a really good bottle of wine, and may in fact still be too young. As to representing Volnay? No clue, I guess we have to wait and see. On that note, why do you guys think Lafarge does not represent typical Volnay? Curious.

 

[Tom Blach]

I do, Sasha.

 

[Unknown]

i'd go with lafarge in volnay too. (i haven't much liked anything that i've had from lafon since the father died, and i've made no effort to keep up, so no comment) -- but i'd add the caveat that, especially as we move up the food-chain, i've admired lafarge's wines as often as i've loved them (shades of roumier, i know).

which got me thinking for a few moments trying to think of anyone i know- (or knew-) of working south of pernand from whom i've had consistently expressive red wine from that is not marked by a distinct house style. the best i can come up with off the top of my head is jean garaudet in pommard, and henri germain in beaune -- if you know their wines, you may get an idea of what i have in mind when i say that i think lafarge has a definite house style (despite the overall gentleness of their process), even if it isn't anything like as extreme as that of say roty, or gouges (or jayer) in the north. (shades of roumier again.)

which is to say that the source of my comment about "blocky imprecision" is as much a comment on the overall standard of red winemaking as it is on the terroirs (some of which can be interesting).

fb.

 

[Unknown]

isn't savigny sort of south of pernand ?

consider the unlikely (but not impossible) scenario that there are 30 known producers in a village, 20 of them suck, 9 of them are OK with a distinct house style, and then there is 1 who is OK without an imposing house style. How do you recognize this last guy for what he is?

 

[Unknown]

originally posted by .sasha:
isn't savigny sort of south of pernand ?

consider the unlikely (but not impossible) scenario that there are 30 known producers in a village, 20 of them suck, 9 of them are OK with a distinct house style, and then there is 1 who is OK without an imposing house style. How do you recognize this last guy for what he is?

guzzle lots of the other 9. like you might do in savigny.

fb.

 

[maureen]

Tom, I don't think comparing the lafon to the same vintages from mugnier and roumier skews the reaction to the lafon. I'm not a big lafon fan, I admit (I'd rather drink volnay from d'angerville or voillot - or, in the old days, pousse d'or than lafon) but it was "apples to apples."

Speaking of overcropping and its salutory effect on terroir - when I say Truchot was an old fashioned winemaker in all the best - and arguably worst - senses of the word, I am of course referring primarily to his overcropping. Of course, he had old vines, which kept down yields somewhat. But he never tried to limit them otherwise and I think it helped make his wines transparent.

 

[MLipton]

originally posted by maureen:

Speaking of overcropping and its salutory effect on terroir - when I say Truchot was an old fashioned winemaker in all the best - and arguably worst - senses of the word, I am of course referring primarily to his overcropping. Of course, he had old vines, which kept down yields somewhat. But he never tried to limit them otherwise and I think it helped make his wines transparent.

Overcropping is a particularly loaded term, Maureen. If you're talking about dry-farmed vines planted on well-drained, poor soils and if they're not clones chosen for their vigor, does lack of green harvesting necessarily lead to overcropping? I suspect that no more than a few generations ago, few vignerons purposefully reduced their crop in a normal year, yet good wines were made even before 1982 (believe it or not!)

Mark Lipton

 

[SFJoe]

originally posted by MLipton:
What is overcropping? asked jesting Chauvet

originally posted by maureen:

Speaking of overcropping and its salutory effect on terroir - when I say Truchot was an old fashioned winemaker in all the best - and arguably worst - senses of the word, I am of course referring primarily to his overcropping. Of course, he had old vines, which kept down yields somewhat. But he never tried to limit them otherwise and I think it helped make his wines transparent.

Overcropping is a particularly loaded term, Maureen. If you're talking about dry-farmed vines planted on well-drained, poor soils and if they're not clones chosen for their vigor, does lack of green harvesting necessarily lead to overcropping? I suspect that no more than a few generations ago, few vignerons purposefully reduced their crop in a normal year, yet good wines were made even before 1982 (believe it or not!)

Mark Lipton

More a question of how tight you prune.

 

[maureen]

originally posted by MLipton:
What is overcropping? asked jesting Chauvet

originally posted by maureen:

Speaking of overcropping and its salutory effect on terroir - when I say Truchot was an old fashioned winemaker in all the best - and arguably worst - senses of the word, I am of course referring primarily to his overcropping. Of course, he had old vines, which kept down yields somewhat. But he never tried to limit them otherwise and I think it helped make his wines transparent.

Overcropping is a particularly loaded term, Maureen. If you're talking about dry-farmed vines planted on well-drained, poor soils and if they're not clones chosen for their vigor, does lack of green harvesting necessarily lead to overcropping? I suspect that no more than a few generations ago, few vignerons purposefully reduced their crop in a normal year, yet good wines were made even before 1982 (believe it or not!)

Mark Lipton

well, I think I implicitly made that point - i.e., truchot had no need to do green harvesting as his old vines tended towards lower yields than younger vines would have - but he also was no advocate of "low yields = better wines" at least according to his US importer.

 

[VLM]

originally posted by SFJoe:

originally posted by MLipton:
What is overcropping? asked jesting Chauvet

originally posted by maureen:

Speaking of overcropping and its salutory effect on terroir - when I say Truchot was an old fashioned winemaker in all the best - and arguably worst - senses of the word, I am of course referring primarily to his overcropping. Of course, he had old vines, which kept down yields somewhat. But he never tried to limit them otherwise and I think it helped make his wines transparent.

Overcropping is a particularly loaded term, Maureen. If you're talking about dry-farmed vines planted on well-drained, poor soils and if they're not clones chosen for their vigor, does lack of green harvesting necessarily lead to overcropping? I suspect that no more than a few generations ago, few vignerons purposefully reduced their crop in a normal year, yet good wines were made even before 1982 (believe it or not!)

Mark Lipton

More a question of how tight you prune.

Beat me to it.

Green harvesting is a shell game.

 

[Unknown]

Explain please (SFJoe and VLM).

 

[SFJoe]

In brief, when you prune in the winter you determine how many bunches of grapes you get in the next spring, you can count the nascent sites on the vine.

If you prune to a generous yield, the vine spreads its nutritious goodness among all the grapes for a long time. If you then throw away some grapes in a green harvest, the remaining clusters don't catch up, and in addition they may get an extra dose of water and etc. and wind up dilute, negating the desired effect of the green harvest.

Or so I've been led to believe by the vignerons that I know who actually do this stuff, as opposed to some guy illuminated by the glow of his screen who should be asleep and is instead opining outside his area of true expertise.

But really, all the hard-ass, take no prisoners growers of my acquaintance are all about pruning, and they are snobs about it.

Pruning for a high yield is safer. Events in the spring (frost, storms, etc.) can further limit your yields, and if you pruned too tight you may find yourself with an uneconomic harvest. So that's the trade that the tough guys challenge their colleagues to take--prune tight for a good year and suck it up if the spring isn't good.

Much more comfortable to prune for a high yield and ditch fruit in July if the spring was copacetic, but again, the Talibs would tell you that it doesn't give the same result. The grapes lack the full investment of the vine through the season and aren't as intense.

 

[Jeff Grossman]

originally posted by SFJoe:
If you prune to a generous yield, the vine spreads its nutritious goodness among all the grapes for a long time. If you then throw away some grapes in a green harvest, the remaining clusters don't catch up, and in addition they may get an extra dose of water and etc. and wind up dilute, negating the desired effect of the green harvest.

I was told that (by a Talib) that they do not drop the fruit till after veraison. This prevents the vine redistributing its largesse.

 

[SFJoe]

originally posted by Jeff Grossman:

originally posted by SFJoe:
If you prune to a generous yield, the vine spreads its nutritious goodness among all the grapes for a long time. If you then throw away some grapes in a green harvest, the remaining clusters don't catch up, and in addition they may get an extra dose of water and etc. and wind up dilute, negating the desired effect of the green harvest.

I was told that (by a Talib) that they do not drop the fruit till after veraison. This prevents the vine redistributing its largesse.

Well, we can disagree across the East River, but what do we know?

Not sure how we settle the question.

 

[Jeff Grossman]

originally posted by SFJoe:
Not sure how we settle the question.

Maybe we don't.

 

[VLM]

originally posted by Jeff Grossman:

originally posted by SFJoe:
If you prune to a generous yield, the vine spreads its nutritious goodness among all the grapes for a long time. If you then throw away some grapes in a green harvest, the remaining clusters don't catch up, and in addition they may get an extra dose of water and etc. and wind up dilute, negating the desired effect of the green harvest.

I was told that (by a Talib) that they do not drop the fruit till after veraison. This prevents the vine redistributing its largesse.

That sounds like belief and not science.

 

[Jeff Grossman]

originally posted by VLM:

originally posted by Jeff Grossman:
I was told that (by a Talib) that they do not drop the fruit till after veraison. This prevents the vine redistributing its largesse.

That sounds like belief and not science.

FWIW, that is a first-hand report to me by a vigneronne. She said that everyone who is serious takes their cues from DRC (including her) and that was their experience. The idea of a green harvest is not new but, when DRC did it circa 1990, the wines were worse off. Everyone was puzzled because it seemed like a good idea. The next time, they waited for veraison then dropped fruit... and got the expected behavior.

 

[Ian Fitzsimmons]

What's the important difference between a green harvest and dropping fruit after veraison?

 

[Jeff Grossman]

originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
What's the important difference between a green harvest and dropping fruit after veraison?

If you drop green fruit then the vine compensates for its lost children by making the other ones bigger (e.g., bloated with water). If you drop black fruit then the vine does not pump more water (but because there are fewer fruit present, each one gets more nutrients than they would have otherwise).

 

[VLM]

originally posted by Jeff Grossman:

originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
What's the important difference between a green harvest and dropping fruit after veraison?

If you drop green fruit then the vine compensates for its lost children by making the other ones bigger (e.g., bloated with water).

In theory.

If you drop black fruit then the vine does not pump more water (but because there are fewer fruit present, each one gets more nutrients than they would have otherwise).

Again, in theory.

Which nutrients and why? Do they do any *good*?

I had the pleasure of dining with a young PhD soil scientist. Discussing actual mechanisms was most interesting.

It's all soil pH and depth.

There is also a lot of signaling going on between the roots and microbes in the soil. Much of it is mitigated by bacteria. Fascinating stuff. I need to trick this girl into marrying me.