I shall soon be heading south again ready for vendanges, the tenth year of my involvement. It’s a period of very hard work, aches and great fun. For Jeff though it is a period of very hard work, aches and great stress. This is his bottom line, will he make money this year or not? I remember reading one winemaker saying that he would only get thirty or so opportunities to make wine in his life and therefore he felt a duty to make the best wine he possibly could each year. Jeff thinks similarly, he wants to produce wine of the best possible quality, but he also needs to make enough wine to pay for salaries, equipment and all the other costs he faces. So, how is 2023 shaping?

In my last post I explained that I did two full vineyard tours in June. In the first, alone, I saw vines in excellent condition. The vines had few signs of disease, well below average. The dry, hot conditions were good for preventing mildew for example. There were lots of bunches of grapes in all vineyards, I felt very optimistic for the vintage. However, on my second tour, with Jeff, he revealed some of the problems caused by those same dry, hot conditions.

One reason why Jeff, Ines and Jérome were tying up the vines, as I described in the last post, is to stop the vines pushing growth of more greenery and foliage so that they can concentrate on developing and ripening fruit. However, the drought also means that some of the vines were already making that decision for themselves. These Clairette vines in Segrairals were producing limited vegetation at the end of June.

The vines were already beginning to take measures to prioritise fruit. Across all the vineyards the vines had many bunches but Jeff pointed out that most of those bunches were half full. Jeff explained that the vines are aborting some of the berries in order that some mature and ripen fully. Better some than none, or all of them being unripe.

This all means that harvest will be difficult. Fewer grapes means a smaller harvest, less wine and income for Jeff. 20mm of rain from October to June was bound to cause problems, that is tantamount to desert conditions. Some storms in July might have brought some relief but 2023 is looking a far from ideal vintage.