Amalie Robert Estate Climate Update: April 2024
Hello and Welcome,
Springtime in Willamette Valley Wine Country. The vines have had their long winter rest and are poised and ready to grow! Bud break came mid-April as is the historical average, so no drama there. We did have a brief time below freezing, 28 degrees to be precise, but we did not experience any frost damage.
They say old cherry orchards make good vineyard sites and this is why. Cherries flower early in the spring. If the orchard is planted in a frost prone area, there will be no cherries. If that continues for a few years in a row, there will be no cherry orchard. Maybe potatoes or corn, but not any crop subject to spring frost.
And this is what Pinot Noir looks like in Willamette Valley Wine Country the day before harvest. Now that the green is on the vine, we can expect about 150 to 165 days of growing season and then The Great Cluster Pluck will be upon us! Yippee Skippee!
In This Communication:
The Big Picture
Winemaking: The Continuation of Terroir by Other Means.®
The Main Story
What Does This Mean and Why Should I Care?
The Numbers
Spring Cleaning
The Big Picture
The vineyard at Amalie Robert Estate is ready! The green rows hold a permanent tall fescue grass cover. The brown rows have had their winter cover crop tilled in and now hold our freshly drilled spring cover crop.
Winemaking: The Continuation of Terroir by Other Means.®
We are living the dream so you don’t have to. Winemaking: The Continuation of Terroir by Other Means.® is a repository of our farming history at Amalie Robert Estate. We have over 200 posts going back some 20 years. It’s all out there on Substack. You can visit the archive for FREE! If you want to see what we see on a more regular basis, follow us on Instagram @AmalieRobert.
Planning to enjoy traveling again and exploring the Willamette Valley? Are you interested in learning about the newest AVA? Download our FREE guide to the Willamette Valley AVA’s!
There are two primary gateways to the Willamette Valley. Most people are familiar with Portland International airport (PDX) at the top of the Willamette Valley. However, there is a second gateway in Eugene (EUG) at the south end of the Willamette Valley. Both of these airports service the major carriers.
Insider Tip: Alaska Airlines offers a Wine Flies Free program from both PDX and EUG. You will need to acquire a wine shipper box as you tour the valley. When you check in for your flight, indicate you have a case of wine, and it will be checked for FREE on Alaska Airlines. BONUS: Many wineries will provide you a FREE wine shipper box with a 6 bottle purchase.
Amalie Robert Estate is open year round by appointment for vineyard tours and tastings. Request a tasting appointment with your preferred day and time.
The Main Story
Keeping it Green. Our grass rows are a permanent fixture of the vineyard floor. Theses rows serve several purposes, including giving us a way to haul our freshly plucked wine berries out of the vineyard.
This time of year, we pull last year’s canes from the trellis and mow them up with the grass. This is easy recycling of nutrients back into the soil. The soil is the vine’s stomach, and this is how we feed them. These permanent rows also provide year-round cover and sustenance for our beneficial insects. If you visit the vineyard at Amalie Robert Estate, you may notice that we often let the grass grow in the roadways and along the edges of the vineyard. We think it is good stewardship.
Ernie also manages our soil moisture by mowing these rows. If there is too much water in the soil during the growing season, he can let the grass grow to deplete it from the soil. If we are in drought conditions, he will mow it short to preserve the soil moisture for the vines.
Tillin’ and Drillin’. The brown rows are freshly tilled and drilled nutrient recycle rows. Here is where the action really is. Our winter cover of peas and grass was tilled in during the rainy days of April. Peas fix nitrogen all winter long and the grass takes it up and holds it. The more nitrogen the grass takes up, the more nitrogen the peas will make available. Tilling incorporates this green material into the soil, where worms and a whole cadre of microbes break it down for the vines. We feed our vines naturally by growing cover crops year round.
Our summer cover crop blend is buckwheat and vetch. Vetch performs the same task of fixing nitrogen during the summer. Nitrogen is a macronutrient and can limit the vine’s growth if it is deficient in the soil. The resulting wine berries can also be deficient in nitrogen and impair fermentation.
Buckwheat is just a fantastic little plant. It has a very short germination to flowering window, which provides pollen based protein to our beneficial insects. Buckwheat also helps make phosphorus more available to the vines. It does all of this with a root system that is about 2 to 4 inches deep, so it survives off the morning dew and does not compete with the vines for soil moisture. And you can make flapjacks out of the seeds to feed the beneficial farmers!
What Does This Mean and Why Should I Care?
Doing the right thing the right way. Unlike humans, the vines don’t really have much of a choice in where they get their nutrients. As winegrowers, our job is to provide nutrients that support vine health to produce wine berries that we can ferment into wine. It is our choice in how we do that. And that comes down to what we believe in. We choose seeds grown by a farmer to grow cover crops to feed our vines, instead of manufactured chemicals.
Another choice we make is harvesting by hand, not machine. More on that as the time draws near.
The Numbers
April weather in the Willamette Valley is a bit of a mixed bag. But it is nice from the standpoint that we get to experience all four seasons in one month! Of course there is rain, a bit of hail from time to time, wind for sure (sometimes excessive) and patches of sun to highlight our days. Hope springs eternal, and we are always on the lookout for our next rainbow. Make it a double!
Interesting, but not necessarily warm. April 2024 logged 136.2 Degree Days with a high temperature of 84.9 degrees Fahrenheit recorded on April 2nd at 3:12 pm, and a low temperature of 28.2 recorded at 6:36 through 6:48 am on April 5th - just 3 days later. Rain was tolerable at 1.53 inches dispersed throughout the month.
More important is what did NOT happen. We did not get sucked out of a Boeing jet side door while in flight. All in all, nothing to complain about.
Spring Cleaning
Dust Bunnies Be Gone! Spring cleaning is upon us. And while domestic household chores are seldom at the top of mind, we will say that very few domestic tasks do not benefit from a glass of Chardonnay, or Pinot Noir, or Pinot Noir Rosé for that matter.
Consider it a reward for a job well done. Kick back with a glass of wine and toast your achievement as you watch the sunset through that sparkly clean picture window. Maybe it is time to tackle the linen closet. Are those things multiplying in there? Do you ever find an empty plate (or wine bottle) in the refrigerator and wonder what might have happened at lights out while the door was closed?
Let’s get this done. Take the win and score some well-priced wines to celebrate spring! Visit your local farmers market brimming with nature’s bounty. The spring Chinook salmon runs are expected to be down, but steelhead is a widely available and popular alternative. And very Pinot Noir friendly. Another seasonal favorite is spring lamb. Check out these 24 spring lamb preparations to see what strikes your fancy. Did someone say Syrah?
Here is the deal: Any 12-bottle case purchase of wine earns an EXTRA 10% off your best price. Domestic ground shipping on 12-bottle cases is also included at no additional cost. If you are picking up, we will apply a $10 credit to your 12-bottle purchase. Trust us, farming 35 acres of wine berries, we know fuel is expensive.
The Big Blue Button will take you there!
We suggest a UPS or FedEx drop point to allow you to pick up your wine at your leisure. It's better on the A-List. A-List members receive a 10% discount on any 1-11 bottle purchase, a 20% discount on a 12-bottle case purchase, and domestic ground shipping is always included with a case. Please email Dena for shipping options to Alaska and Hawaii.
Kindest Regards,
Dena & Ernie
Other Resources
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