Vineyard Update June 2024

After several years of extreme weather, 2024 is tracking to be a welcomed “normal” growing season for Nova Scotia’s Gaspereau Valley wine region. Winter temperatures were mild and did not damage buds like the polar vortex of 2023. And spring frosts were a distant memory. We certainly learned from the spring frost of 2018 though and this year left a kicker cane on each vine – an extra cane to delay budbreak and for “insurance”, and we are currently pruning them off now that frost danger is gone.

All this adds up to our estate vineyard looking esthetically pleasing and poised to give us incredible grapes for its 19th year! More wood than ever before had to be pruned off this year from the effects of polar vortex bud killing, so we bought ourselves a more powerful mulching mower to return nutrients back to rows. Chris, our vineyard supervisor, has been mechanically weeding under vines with our Clemens grape hoe and preparing end of rows for planting cilantro to attract insect predators, part of a biodiversity component of our Biocyclic Vegan certification. Horsetail tea will be harvested this week for brewing, one of our organic practices to protect vines from mildew disease.

Take a vineyard tour with vineyard supervisor, Chris. Click here 

Horsetail Tea preparation

Lower blocks of Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Noir were hit hard in winter 2023 but luckily many vines grew new trunks from the lower graft union. Not much pruning was required this year, only tying these precious canes to the fruiting wire. The vines with severe winter damage will be replanted this spring and next spring, and delivery of Pinot Noir vines from the nursery should be next week.

~ Bruce