Tags
2011 vintage, Charlottesville, Glen Manor Vineyards, Hurricane Irene, Jefferson Vineyards, Keswick Vineyards, Local Wine, VA, VaWine, Virginia Wine
These are the Years to Learn From – Thoughts on the 2011 Vintage from Jefferson Vineyards Winemaker Andy Reagan
As I noted in my last post, 2011 will be remembered by many here in Virginia, in particular by winemakers, as a year of weather extremes — early(ish) spring frost, consecutive days of triple digit temperatures coupled with oppressive humidity, an earthquake, followed by Hurricane Irene that dumped 10″ to 16″ of rain in many parts of the state.
Unfortunately, the rain continued in the weeks following Irene. In the Front Royal area, just over six inches of rain fell over the last 30 days, raising fears that 2011 may well end up like 2003 when many vineyards throughout Virginia (and the east coast) suffered as a result of high winds and torrential rains from Hurricane Isabel.
Several Virginia winemakers — Stephen Barnard, winemaker at Keswick Vineyards on the Keswick blog, and Jeff White of Glen Manor Vineyards on the Wine Berserkers forum — have shared their thoughts on these weather challenges. For additional perspective, I asked Andy Reagan, winemaker and General Manager of Jefferson Vineyards, to share his thoughts on what will become of 2011:
It’s 6:30 am. I just woke up after hitting the snooze button a few times, busy day ahead, probably need more than 2
cups of coffee. After zipping through my normal a.m. routine, I step outside for my first smoke and cup of joe. Another grey, muggy morning brings another sigh. For weeks now I’ve been forced to listen to the sound of tires splashing down the country roads and water dripping off of the gutter… pure torture. Just another day during the worst vintage I can remember.
To most industry insiders 2003 has been the benchmark for the worst-case scenario sadly 2011 has easily prompted me to think fondly of our prior crappy harvest standard. 2003 was wet, 3 sunny days in May, constant downpours, hot humid funky weather. That year there were 3 hurricanes whose remnants swept through the state in September. Yes, 2003 sucked, but at least there were periods it didn’t rain during harvest. This year we’ve had rain every day for the past 3 weeks. The whites came in well below desired ripeness. The reds, well ours our still hanging, but I’ve heard many folks have lost entire crops. Sorting tables are a necessity this year as rot rules supreme and winemaker interventions will be common. If any winemaker says they were minimalists in 2011, don’t drink their wine, and tell them they should be ashamed for lying. I was amazed last year that we were finished picking by the end of September we accomplished that because of the long dry and hot year with some of the best fruit I’ve ever seen. This year I am again stunned that we’ll finish picking so early, though thoroughly annoyed that it is a result of having no canopy to support the hanging fruit. Honestly it is a year to forget already, can we move on to 2012 please?
Rainy, foggy, crummy weather and all though, we still have a job to do. These are the vintages we have to expect in Virginia, they are inevitable and used to be the norm. We have been spoiled with a string of fortunate years. 2004 was great compared to 2003 but 2005 through 2010 were nothing short of outstanding, I think St. Vincent was feeling bad for us having suffered through 2003, hopefully we’ll kick off another long run of great vintages beginning with 2012. In the meantime dealing with the mess at hand; how will we produce wine of distinction? Can we make a wine with any real complexity? To be frank, (not Frank but frank) it is going to be tough. The whites will be easier than the reds. Our Pinot Gris actually ripened nicely before the onslaught of rain this September. And thank you God for Petit Manseng, by far the toughest grape ever. Between those two the whites will easily be as delicious as ever. The reds though, unfortunately we depend too heavily on seed and skin tannin to help turn that murky juice into the deep beautiful complex mouth filling brilliance we all love in a good red, so unless somehow we get lucky and have a couple weeks of warm sunny days and cool nights, get a little dehydration and somehow stave off the botrytis, well let’s just say I hope rose’s popularity sky rockets soon. I’ll do what I can with the reds, 30% bleeding, delestage twice a day and very hot, short fermentation will be key, judicious use of oak and forest selection will play a big role too, I’m willing to bet something will turn out great. For now, what though remains to be seen.
These are the years to learn from. They test are commitment to making great wine. This is the type of year that reminds us to not take anything for granted, that when it all comes down to it we really control very little in this industry and even in life. We need these standards to remind us to appreciate the better days, the priceless moments we typically expect, these are the moments in life that help us showcase our talents, give us character and some much needed humility. It’s 11:40 a.m. 2 press loads in to the day, sunny, 75° with a light breeze, perhaps the better days to come just arrived.
Thanks Andy for coming in from the rain to share your insights and thoughts on the 2011 vintage. I hope a few other winemakers will share their experiences and thoughts on the 2011 vintage, weather permitting 😉 . I’m curious how many harvested their whites prior to Irene, especially the Viognier.
Oh, one last word … it rained today.
__________________________________
Questions, Comments, Complaints, Random Observations? Contact Me Here
__________________________________
Drink What YOU Like 
Yes, indeed, this has been about the most difficult harvest on record. And perhaps the most difficult season in memory. It rained when we needed sun, and it continue to rain when vineyard managers were trying to bring the fruit in. See more on http://projectsunlight.net.
Thanks for this post, Frank, really good stuff.
Thanks for commenting, Bob. The most difficult vintage in quite some time, but not sure 2011 rivals 2003 in terms of overall ‘crappiness’ (not sure that’s a real word but seems appropriate since it happens to be raining right now). I’m hoping many of the whites were brought in just prior to Hurricane Irene… not sure what to expect from Virginia reds. Not promising. Cheers!
Not a season that will be remembered by choice to be sure! I hope folks are able to salvage something from it. I know it is a tough business to be in without a year like this and the economic forces at work make this bad timing.
I am going to be reaching out to some of my local winemakers to see how things have been for them this year. Our weather hasn’t been as wet, but it was hot and that can be trouble up here for different reasons.
Jason
Thanks for stopping by to comment, Jason. 2011 is definitely not a vintage that will be remembered fondly, but there will certainly be a few good wines for sure. A few (maybe more than a few) picked whites before Irene so I’m hoping we’ll see some nice whites. Look forward to hearing what the winemakers in your area have to say about 2011. Cheers!
I call this vintage something other than a learning experience but can’t write that here. With out sun shinning for days on end the rot is really creeping through the vineyards I’ve seen and read about in other areas in the mid atlantic. Don’t have an exact rain count but think the northern Virginia vineyards have received the most rain. Sort sort sort sort sort!
Hi Jeff: I’m not opposed to the use of swear words here in the comments… but the WordPress Comment Filter seems to frown on cursing. 🙂 I believe you may be correct with regard to the amount of rain in the Loudoun area. In looking through NOAA precipitation statistics, NoVa has had record precip: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/service/national/Divisionalprank/201009-201108.gif
And, correct me if I’m wrong… ‘sorting, sorting, sorting’ is important in every vintage, no? Cheers!
This vintage is tough, absolutely, and I would love to be sitting in the sun of 2010 waiting patiently to harvest because I could. However, it is also a great to to get a better understanding your vineyard for any future poor vintages and also forces us to think outside the box.
Sorting, absolutely necessary, however I think this year in particular that needs to happen in the vineyard more then in the winery. Sorting in the winery is great, but I also think at times it can slow the process that quite honestly needs to be lightening fast in years like this year. If splitting berries are left held too long being sorted VA can spread very fast on the sorting table as well. I am not saying sorting is bad, we have simply poured out lugs very slow to catch any off clusters. Not off berries, but ny cluster that is affected, get rid of it. Once it hits the press or destemmer, it is go time and has to get chilled or fermenting.
Andy is right about non-intervention winemaking though. I am normally a huge advocate, btu this year I am all about the yeast and enzymes that Scott labs can offer me. No lessez-fare approach of slow settling and indigenous yeast this year.
I don’t however think that rot is the worst issue of the year. Do we have some rot, sure, but that is easy to solve through vineyard sorting, culling and multi-pass harvesting. The big issue is dilution and therefore issues with concentration. Our wines and juices so far have decent flavor and aromatic characters, but they simply are not as intense as the past several years. For our later ripeners we have equipped our 8000 sq foot Compost shed into and Appassimento shed. Layered with straw and big ass fans and wrapped with perferated plastic we are simply drying our fruit our to get some concentration “hopefully”. Trying this will either help us make some respectful reds, or could make me a complete dud.
The one important arguement I have is against the hope of grapes being picked prior to Irene, especially Viognier. It was simply too early to do so and those grape just wont be ripe. There would be more concentrated unripe characters, as apposed to more subtle ripe characters. Either way is not the best.
I do think there will be some gems out there to be had, and hopefully some incredible QPR from 2011. I know we plan to make some different wines and won’t be making our Single Vineyard or Commonwealth Collection wines which might make the entry level wines that much better. We also will be pricing our wines accordingly to the vintage. It is still too early to stress, plus how does stressing help anyway. Just work hard, try to make some decent juice and see what is in the tanks and barrels when the dust settles. Will it go down as a crappy year, sure, but there will be some shining stars I assure you.
************************************************************************
************************************************************************
Jordan – Thanks much for your thoughts on this subject. You make several great points as always… but this one sentence really caught my attention:
“We also will be pricing our wines accordingly to the vintage. ”
This is a VERY interesting statement. Pricing according to vintage makes logical sense, especially from my frugal consumer standpoint. However, given the current potential double-dip economic malaise, when margins at most wineries are already razor thin, and some here in Virginia are just barely hanging on, I have a difficult time believing too many wineries will be lowering their prices for the 2011 vintage (I hope I’m wrong tho). Of course, there will be a few superb wines from this vintage as well, which will mean a price increase.?.? 🙂
Realize this is a crazy busy time for you and that the winery is likely packed this weekend, but if you could expand on this one sentence in terms of what “pricing wines accordingly” will mean. With 2011 shaping up to be a less than stellar vintage by most accounts, I presume wines will be priced lower than, say, 2010 or 2007? How and when is this pricing decision made? Very curious if other wineries will do the same?
Since I had not discovered the virtues of wine in 2003 – one of the worst VA vintages in many years prior to/and since – I’m not sure if prices of ’03’s reflected the quality of that vintage (I assume so). But 2003 was different that 2011, obviously, in many ways. Perhaps the increased competition here in Virginia coupled with other factors like the economy (altho Virginia has weathered the storm quite well indeed) will force wineries to take the same approach and ‘price wines accordingly.’ A cursory look at wine prices over the last few years, I’ve not seen too many (any) price decreases and there have been some questionable wines.
Again, thanks for the comment and peeking my curiosity!
Couple points to discuss here.
1) This year will not be like 2003. The vintage is wet and crappy like 2003, but that was all year so there was no flavor development through the summer months like there was this year. It is also a very different industry in comparison to 2003. There are more trained winemakers, more educated growers, more serious wineries in terms of quality, and many have been able to learn from these experience before now. This year will be better then 2003 strictly because we did have a great summer and there is a lot more experience, passion and knowledge in Virginia then 8 years ago.
2) On the pricing side of things, sure everyone runs on a tight margin, but inventory management is the number 1 killer for wineries. More wineries have difficulty because of poor vintage inventory then any other reason. 2011 is not a year that you look at you accountants spread sheet and aim for you percentage margin. A year like 2011 is a matter of re-cooping you cost and move on. You won’t get rich in 2011, but you also don’t need to lose your shirt or have a 24 month sale cycle. Regardless how good a wine is, there will be a consumer perception from the get go with 2011. We will likely not be making our Single Vineyard wines or our Commonwealth Collection wines. This is for two reasons. One is that there likely won’t be enough production that I will deem to be of the standard I have for these wines and the wines may struggle to have a sense of place. The other reason is that by taking my top wines a putting them into other wines I can still make a well rounded quality portfolio in an off year. We will likely make several varietal wines that we no longer do and will likely make “2011 Blends” that may take from several vineyards to be the best wine they can be instead of reminiscent of a site. These wines would be in the $15-25 range probably instead of our Single Vineyard pricing of $30-50. We also may end up releasing these simultaneously or even before our 2010’s to slow the sales of 2010s to maintain some higher end wines. We may also give allotments on time for 2010 inventory. Who knows, but it is not the consumers fault it is raining either and we simply will not charge more then we feel a wine is worth and the reality is 2011 won’t match up to 2010 so why price it like it would. Unfortunately this year is also the most expensive production year I have ever had. We ran our regular low yields and now have been loosing a tremendous amount in the vineyard of that already low crop. We are picking our Hill Block Cab Franc today (our only Cab Franc of the year as all other have been completely declassified and will be made into Verjus) and in some rows (they are roughly 300 feet long) we are only getting 1-2 lugs (25-50 lbs). Needless to say Cab Franc will not be one of those varietal wines, but we are only bringing in what we feel we can work with. It is expensive and the wine will be cheap. That sucks, but it is worth it for the long run. Just look at Cali vintages like 1998 and 2000. Some of these wines have turned out to be truly profound after some age to calm the acidity, but no one can sell them. We are not the only ones who have had a bad vintage before. Look at the Southern Rhone in 2002 where almost every respectable CdP producer declassified the entire vintage to either Cotes du Rhone or their second wines. It was a big expense, but allows the consumer to respect what they get year in year out. These vintages happen everywhere, and everyone prices accordingly and we will need to as well. Luckily for us bad vintages are the theme of 2011 everywhere. Major storms in hail to kick start harvest in Bordeaux, floods in Yarra Valley, Cold and some rain around Cali, hail in Argentina. A lot of places are getting hit this year. What do you do? Make the best of it and move on to 2012.
As said before, there will be some good juice out there. It should also have some of the best QPR that we have seen in a while. That is our direction anyway.
Do not count on too many direct price reductions and dont expect wineries to even want to address this. Believe me allot of wineries are worried about this years wines. The end consumer will see indirect price reductions by wineries producing less of their reserve high end wines. Maybe Rose fans will be happy next spring. The experienced winemakers are going to be fine this year. Look around the state its the inexperienced ones that should be worried.
Pingback: Weekly Virginia Wine News Round Up: 10-1-11 | Virginia Wine Trips
Hi Frank,
I’m a little late in responding to this topic but I’ve been somewhat preoccupied. I’ll start with, I am a non-interventionist or minimalist winemaker or better, I’m an interventionist winegrower and also, I do not lie. I’ve read the proclamation “pick or perish”. I’ve read “this is the year of the winemaker”. I say this is not the year of the faint of heart and as with every year but especially in 2011, this is the year of the vineyard site. I still have plenty of healthy canopy and with the exception of a little Merlot, which came in last week all of our red grapes are still hanging and ripening. Yes, I’ve lost some crop to botrytis and we will leave grapes both in the field and under the sorting tables but this is probably a good thing as there is now so much negativism in the public’s perception of 2011.
Bottom line is, our grapes were not ripe before all the rains and now they are or as with Cabernet Sauvignon, will be soon. We are picking Cabernet Franc and Merlot this week. During September and in spite of the rains our grapes ripened. Flavors, skins and seeds matured. No adjustments in the cellar will be necessary. Before the rains our Merlot and Cabernet Franc were sitting at 19 to 20 Brix. Flavors were green. Now Brix are pushing 24, Cabernet Sauvignon is at 21, and with no more green flavors. Well drained vineyard sites, soil and slope, bird netting plus low yields and meticulous attention to the canopy all throughout the growing season have allowed the fruit to continue to hang. This is still not a great year but the wines will be ripe and flavorful and an honest expression of my site and the year. It’s too early to say with any confidence but I would think that I’ll be making little of my first label, Hodder Hill and will de-classify most everything to Vin Rouge. But I’ll know more in December once it’s in barrel.
Since 2007 my reds have always been at or slightly above 14% alcohol. This year they should be in the mid to upper 13’s and with no added sugar, I promise.
Hello Jeff W: Thanks for stopping by to comment. I appreciate your thoughts on this subject, especially your response to ‘this is the year of the winemaker.’ 2011 certainly highlights the importance of ‘site, site, site!’ I’m glad to hear your fruit ripened – vineyards in other in parts of the state were not as lucky. “An honest expression of my site and the year” – spoken like a true minimalist winemaker. As with every vintage I look forward to trying, but sad to hear there will not be as much Hodder Hill to go around (which happens to be my favorite GM wine). I look forward to a visit in early November. All the best!