Mid November

After a dry summer it was an especially wet fall so far. September and October saw a lot of rain over 10 inches or 250mm. The vines did very well this year all made it to the top wire, next year the vines will produce a half (50%) of a crop, that way the "extra energy" will go into root production. The plants have hardened off nicely as you can see in the following pics by looking at the brown/red coloured canes which indicates a cane that is prepared for the coming winter.

Pinot Noir clone 828 prepared for the winter

Chardonnay 548 ready for winter

Soil will be added to cover the graft union for the winter

New section added onto the vineyard

The only thing left to do now is to add topsoil to cover the graft union for the winter as an added layer of protection in case we get a  severe winter. This is done especially in the first few years to protect the graft while the graft union both heals and matures, eventually a grape hoe ( a mechanical hoe) will be used to cover the graft up with soil for the winter, although the primary use of a hoe is to control weeds it can be used to hill up the plants with top soil too.

The new site which is north of the vineyard is a small addition triangular in shape, for the purpose of using up as much of the field as possible. The addition will extend 6 rows  4 rows of chardonnay 548 and 2 rows Pinot noir 828. The stake in the above picture is the location of the endpost.  

That's all for now I'll add something a little later after I mound up the vines with soil, I will also include a rainfall total from my 2 rain gauges.