Vintage Report 2018
Published on August 25, 2018
About
Sarsfield Estate is a small farm in the Lakes and Wilderness area of
East Gippsland, in the South-eastern corner of Australia.
We use solar and wind energy and depend entirely on rainwater.
Our wines vary naturally as the seasons change, and it is a fascinating challenge to understand how a season is reflected in the wine it produces.
This is why we write vintage reports.
Vintage Report 2018
- a beautiful case moth, but no sign of bud burst one week after the usual time
Winter was extremely dry and colder than usual, with a particularly cold spell with frost at around our normal time of budbreak. The vines were slow to start growing with Pinot noir 2 weeks behind time.
Wildlife seemed desperate for food - two dozen kangaroos share-farming, a flock of wallabies and several possums raiding the vegetable garden every night and sugar gliders and feather-tail gliders coming in for water.
- retarded growth in October
October gave us cool and overcast weather with frequent drizzle of no substance. Dams in our area were very low at that stage and a lot of people relaying on rain for their drinking water had to buy in water.
The vines simply didn’t grow and what little vine growth we got was eaten by the hungry wallabies, again, and again.
But no, we don’t think the solution to any problem is a gun.
- undersized shoots and wilting growing tips in November
- little is left after wallabies
Eventually a heavy thunderstorm on November, 17th poured out 10 mm of rain in 10 minutes, but it mostly run down the paddock and the following weeks were around 30°C and the growing tips of our vines started to die. The rain promised by the Bureau of Meteorology never came – a sure sign of drought.
- And for the first time we found them actually
- turning into the spectacular moth
And the next sign of drought, the grasshoppers, arrived in numbers never seen before and started to do severe damage. Our chickens and several hundred Ibis thought it wonderful, but we had our reservations. Some years it is heartbreaking to watch the destruction and wait for the natural balance to restore itself, without racing out to spray insecticides.
But yet again we got away without!
In November we noticed that surprisingly, vines in moister areas of the vineyard were growing even slower than the super dry ones. Presumably the usually spoilt vines have a smaller root system to support them in times of drought. However, due to the dry weather fruit-set was excellent and produced full bunches.
- Mid summer: turning green again, but the grass is very short.
- Kangaroos, helping us with the grazing management
Just before the year ended as the driest on record we had one very good rain event, followed by two more two and five weeks later, in January. The farm turned green again, and the vines, fruit trees and eucalypts made up some of the growth they missed in spring. Grape berries were blown up to a good size and we started thinning heavily.
- Wallabies surviving on vine leaves...
- ...eating the same vines ...
- ...again and again.
The ringtail possums under the shed roof doing the bio-thermometer. Rolled into 2 little balls in cold weather.......
...and stretched out on their backs, tails hanging out and paws waving when it is hot.
And then the one hot day of the season burnt a lot of grapes, tomatoes, apples, peppers and other things. It only takes one day sometimes to spoil a whole year’s work.
- sunburn
- after just one
- hot day.
The danger in drought conditions is that the grapes just shrivel rather than ripen. This causes high sugar levels, but also high acid, unripe flavours and tannins and generally unbalanced wine. However, with careful irrigation we managed to keep the ripening process more or less even.
- in windy conditions
- got still done in time.
Vintage started on the 2nd of March and we were very glad to have more pickers than usual to deal with the fairly high yield and quickly maturing grapes. Five weeks later all the grapes were picked and fermenting. Yields were good and flavours and colours intense.
Overall not an easy year, but quite a promising vintage!
