News

Cabernet Franc is going through its secondary fermentation in a plastic carboy with airlock. Vidal Blanc is doing the same and trying to clear itself of its strange green color. The two Cabernet Sauvignon batches are still fermenting in tubs with cheese cloth on the top. We have been punching down the cap a few times a day. Both caps are starting to form more slowly, which is a sign that fermentation is slowing. Soon we will press both and rack them into carboys.

In corporate news, Fraser Hall Wine Company is taking steps to diversify its portfolio of beverages in response to market conditions and as part of our risk management strategy. In other words, we makin' more booze!

Our corporate board approved a proposal to start a mead project. Mead is a honey based spirit that is thought to be the oldest alcoholic beverage. It undergoes fermentation, just like wine and beer, and is clear or a golden color. The aging process is similar to a red wine. It can be drank a year after fermentation and should taste fine, but will get much better with age.

We located an apiary (beekeeper) in Centreville, VA, who is going to provide the honey.

Finally, our website is under construction and should be up and rolling in a few weeks. We outsourced the work to a VA Tech grad.

Cab Franc

100 lbs of Cab Franc were crushed and de-stemmed on Monday night while everyone else was celebrating the voyage of Columbus, the puffy shirted Spaniard.

We tested the must and it was extremely low in acid. We added a bunch of acid. The juice tasted much better afterwards. It was very sugary tasting at first with little pucker factor. Afterwards it started to taste like grape juice. Hopefully this will improve the final product.

John added yeast on Tuesday and the Cab Franc must is patiently bubbling away in the 20 gallon bucket.

We are picking up 200 lbs of Cab Sauvingon on Saturday, which will complete our grape purchases for this year.

Meanwhile, our vidal blanc is persistently fermenting away. We know it's fermenting away b/c the airlock is constantly bubbling and John's basement smells like a cross between a sweaty feet and hard boiled eggs.

More pictures to come.

Grapes Arrived!

We trekked up to Mt. Airy, Maryland this morning, Sunday, October 5, 2008 to pick up 200 lbs of grapes from Maryland Crush. We purchased two 20 gallon, food grade trash cans from Home Depot, loaded them and a few other necessities into John's truck and headed out.


After a quick stop in Purcellville to pick up a side of cow for John, we went Northeast to Rob's house in Mt. Airy. There were two other groups there to pick up grapes when we arrived. We sat back while Rob helped the group of men in front of us to crush and de-stem their Syrah grapes.

When it was our turn, Rob took us to his garage, which was fitted with a huge meat locker like refridgerator. He went in and returned with a lug of Vidal Blanc. We ended up getting four lugs of Vidal Blanc, which topped out at 100 lbs. Unfortunately he ran out of Merlot and so we are going to get 50 more lbs of Cab Franc and Cab Sauvignon when they are harvested.


We got set up on the crusher, de-stemmer and went to town: I poured one lug at a time into the top of the crusher and John hand cranked the crusher, which separates the stems from the berries as it crushes the berries. The must (juice, skins, pulp and seeds) falls through the bottom into a large bucket.



The Vidal must filled 3/4 of the 20 gallon trash can and we added Pectic Acid and Metabisulfate to the must: the Pectic Acid helps to break down the skins to extract flavor and the Metabisulfate kills native yeasts that may be living in the must.

Back at John's house we used the new press to get 6 gallons of juice from the 100 lbs of Vidal grapes. The 6 gallons is sitting patiently in our fermentation bucket waiting for some yeast, which we will add tomorrow.



The 20 gallon trash can filled with Vidal Blanc must.



The Vidal Blanc grape must.



The wine press awaiting some action. We use cheese cloth on the inside of the press to keep the solids from running out.






Juice flowing out of the press into the bucket.



Juice with a few seeds. The juice is incredibly cloudy and does not resemble wine at all.



The wood blocks are used to press down on the must.



Here is what the grapes look like after being pressed.


Six gallons of wonderful juice.

Grapes are coming.

We are receiving 200 lbs of grapes this weekend, October 4, 2008: 100 lbs of Vidal Blanc and 100 lbs of Merlot.

We are still waiting on word of the Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon. The initial order had been for 200 lbs of Cabernet Sauvignon, but that was changed this past week when we found out that we could get some Virginia Cab Franc.

The plan is still to make Ebrietas as a red blend, but the blend has taken on a new dimension now that a third varietal is in the picture. Having no experience blending, it will be interesting to experiment later with different blends of the three reds. I dont know if we will just combine all or combine two and bottle one on its own.

We will drive up to Mt Airy, Maryland this Sunday to crush and de-stem the Vidal and Merlot. Although we have some ideas, we have yet to purchase travel vessels. It looks like we will use 20 gallon food grade buckets from Home Depot.

Once back from Maryland, we will let the Vidal must (skins, seeds, juice, pulp) sit for a few hours and then press the must to extract the juice. This juice will go into a smaller 6 gallon carboy and yeast will be added to start the fermentation process. The Merlot must will be fermented with juice, skins, seeds and pulp and pressed only after a few weeks once fermentation has finished and we have gotten enough flavor from the skins and seeds. The Merlot must will also be pressed into a 6 gallon carboy to age and go through any subsequent fermentation.

Our hope with the Vidal is to leave a bit of residual sugar, which will mean a lower alcohol wine with a sweet taste. The Vidal will probably need to age for at least 6 months, possibly a year until it can be released. We have not determined when we will bottle the Vidal.

The Merlot and the other two red varietals will age much longer than the Vidal. Regardless of when we decide to blend and bottle, Ebrietas, in whatever form it takes, will not be available for at least a year and half to two years.

Pictures! September 2008

A vibrant Vidal Blanc vine with new growth.

A Cabernet Franc vine with new growth. You can see the older, disease ridden leaves beneath it.

One of the most vigorous Cabernet Franc vines. This one is in need of a trim.

Vidal Blanc vine. This one is growing a little sideways and needs to be straightened. Guard dog in the background. Searching for deer no doubt.

Cabernet Franc. You can see the dead grass underneath this row that we killed with newspaper.

New growth on a Cabernet vine that has worried us in the past.

A wide shot from below the vineyard. Depending on how much we clear this fall, we should have plenty of room to put at least four more rows in.

Newsletter Release

We are currently putting the finishing touches on the first edition of a newsletter that will help us stay in touch in a more concise fashion than the blog. It will also be the primary way of making our wine available to our friends and family.

If you have not yet signed up for the newsletter, please do by visiting our website for Fraser-Hall Wine Company and entering your info.

If you have signed up, be on the look out for the newsletter in the next week or so.

Biding Our Time

Here is the state of some of the nicer looking vines in September.

We have been spraying for mildew and rot for several weeks now and it seems to be having a positive impact on the quality of the new growth. We are seeing less and less of the small, sickly leaves that were abundant before spraying.

pictures

A vidal blanc vine with a fake bunch of grapes. Ahhhhh..... Someday...

John driving the small tractor. He hasnt passed the exam to operate the big one yet.

One of four imbeciles.

Now we know what we are growing and where.

Who needs their prostate checked out?

A trench dug for the PVC pipe. It was a little too humid for digging.

Sawing PVC pipe in dangerous fashion.

The hose attachment end.

A low shot of the PVC hooked up to the drip line.

The finished product.

Observations

New pictures are on the way. I havent had time this week to upload the pictures we took this past weekend, August 9, 2008.

What we accomplished last Saturday was to install PVC pipe underground that connects the four drip lines so that all can be watered at once. Before we had to hook up the hose to each row individually and water 4 times as long.

We also put down wet newspaper along the cab franc rows in an effort to kill the grass that is growing. We topped the wet newspaper with manure. We suspect that the cab franc rows are fighting a losing battle with the several large oak trees nearby for water and nutrients. Their growth is less vigorous than the vidal, which are further away. Killing the grass underneath the trellis will remove some of the competition from the vine roots and the manure will give them a nutrient boost.

The vidal blanc vines look very healthy. They are almost uniform in their growth with a few exceptions. The cab franc are more spotty. Some look great and others look abysmal. A few cab franc are so pathetic that we may just cut the growth off this winter and let them start over.

We have made two fungicide applications. The first was the stylet oil and mancozeb. The second was agri-fos and stylet oil. So far the new growth looks healthy and free of disease. Hopefully the fungicides will keep it that way.

A few japanese beetles are still flying around and chewing on the leaves. We haven't sprayed sevin in a few weeks and probably wont for the rest of the year. The few beetles that do show up can be taken off by hand and squashed. It will be interesting to see if there are less next year b/c of the milky spore applied in the past.

Winery Equipment: The Press

After putting in our first order of fresh grapes, it is time to get serious about this whole winemaking process. As we may have mentioned in the past, our supplier MDCrush does do all of our processing on site to include Crushing and Pressing of the grapes. However this can become a problem when considering that wines, both white and red, benefit susbtancially from first being crushed and combined with the juice and then the pulp pressed after a given amount of time.

How were we going to be able to press our grape pulp in Maryland after carting it home and allowing it combine with the existing grape juice? The only obvious answer, or at least the only one we thought of was to buy our own press:


I have named her "Lady Luck" because I figure if there anything in this whole process that we are doing, it's pressing our luck. Ah, but pathetic atempts at humor aside, this little beauty is capable of pushing out 16 quarts of grapes in a single press. Her ratchet style action allows for greater pressing with less work, and her easy pour bottom spout allows the juice to quickly be funneled directy into my mouth.

She is being shipped from Lehmans.com and I will post more pictures of her unboxing when she arrives in late August, I know our readers can't wait.

Fall Crush Order

It's official. We just put in an order for 400 lbs of of red and white grapes through MDCrush in Mt. Airy, Maryland. This will be our first attempt at making wine from fresh Virginia grapes and will be the first of hopefully many successful vintages.

Our preliminary order consists of 100 lbs of Vidal Blanc, 200 lbs of Carbernet Franc, and 100 lbs of Merlot. According to Rob, a really laid back guy who runs the operation, the White grapes usually come in sometime in September and the Red grapes sometime in October. The time frames can be pretty broad and they usually only have a week window of when the harvest will actually take place. This is primarily due to the overall seasonal conditions, and when the vineyards think it is ideal to harvest the grapes. As with many things in business - sans WalMart - we are at the beck and call of our suppliers.

According to Rob, each 100 lbs order should net us approximately 6 gallons of wine, give or take. However, as Rob noted and I have found out, there is often a lot of variance on this amount, based on grape and cluster size at harvest, how hard you press the grapes, and how much is lost during racking and aging. Rob was quick to point out that we can always add a few pounds if need be to round up our supplies as close to 6 gallons as possible.

As Mike mentioned in the previous post we will be making a standalone white, Vidal Blanc, which should be ready to drink by fall or winter of 2009. The Red wine, which will actually be a blend of the Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon is our Ebrietas reserve and should be available in 2010, so get your order in soon!

Details on how you can get your hands on some of Fraser Hall Wine Company's first vintage will be coming soon.

Fungicide

I bought three fungicides yesterday to spray on the vines: Mancozeb, JMS Stylet Oil and Agri-Fos. Agri-Fos is a commercial name for phosphorous acid. According to one internet source, Phosphorous acid kills downy mildew and helps to preclude new growth by stimulating plants to develop their own defense mechanism (dont ask me how they do that). JMS Stylet Oil is a white mineral oil that treats powdery mildew pre and post infection. Stylet Oil also has insecticide properties. Mancozeb controls for downy mildew, botrytis and black rot.

All three come as a concentrate that is mixed into a gallon of water and applied through a sprayer. Our sprayer is a small hand pump one.

The concensus on a grape growing message board was that our vines are fighting with mildew and this is stunting their growth. We should have been spraying for mildew from the start of the summer, but ignorance got the best of us.

Our trip down to Culpeper last weekend, July 26, was sobering. The vines look OK, but most have some serious issues. Many have new, impressive growth, but wilted older leaves that look sick. The Vidal Blanc vines look much better than the Cab Franc. I'm sure this is because Vidal Blanc is much more resilient in the face of disease pressure and their location on the hill is further from the trees.

Results of the fungicide soon. Try not to fall over while you are on the edge of your seat.

Also, we have found a source of Virginia grapes that will sell in quantities less than a half ton. We had only found one source prior to this most recent discovery that would sell us anything under one ton (1/2 ton). This exception would still mean an almost $900 investment in grapes. Not to mention the work required to crush, ferment, press and age 1000 lbs of grapes.

So, now we can buy a few hundred pounds of one or two different varieties and try our hand at winemaking!

Mildew: Its not just in your shower

We should have known that we would not be the exception to the rule.

We started to notice that some of our Cab Franc vines were looking a little rough; their leaves were starting to turn colors, shrivel up and fall off. It could have been the grow tubes. It could also be mildew. I noticed some mildew on a few leaves in the past, but disregarded it as an aberration and went about my business. Now it seems that those infected leaves may have spread mildew to others.

Mildew is not particular to Virginia, but it is prevalent because of the humidity. Most vineyards have to spray a variety of fungicides to keep the mildew under control. The problem doesn't end there, however, because the number of mildews and fungicides are many.

The three most common types of mildew are powdery, downy and phomopsis. Each produces distinct symptoms and affects the vine differently. The mildew can be ID'ed based on the discoloration of the leaf and the side of the leaf that hosts the midew spores.

Mildew is treated various ways; the constant being that the treatment regimen must vary. Mildew adapts quickly to one type of fungicide if used extensively. In fact, most fungicide instructions recommend at most two consecutive applications and no more than four the entire season.

The fungicide that we found locally was neem oil based. Neem oil is an organic treatment that specifically targets powdery mildew. It was applied on July 19, 2008. The results seem good so far. We are travelling down to Culpeper on Saturday, July 26 to see for ourselves.

Pictures and updated blathering will follow.

This is starting to look like a real vineyard!

Evaluation of Sevin

We hesitated to use Sevin on our vines, but changed out minds as soon as we saw the damage that would be done by the Japanese Beetles. So far Sevin seems to be fairly effective at preventing massive damage by JB. The end of May brought swarms of newly developed JB and they immediately started attacking the leaves on the vines. An application of liquid Sevin killed any JB that ate at the leaves and, we hope, dissuaded others from even attempting.

On the July 4th weekend I had a chance to look over the vines and inspect the JB damage. I found that some vines had many dead beetles around the base and some had very few. I dont know why some vines are targeted and others not. It may be that the targeted ones were simply chosen randomly at first or chosen because they had particularly attractive leaves and the other JB just followed suit. This would make sense because JB excrete a substance while feeding that attracts other beetles to the location. None of the vines had serious damage. Many had a few leaves that had holes in them.

While I was walking down the rows I did see a few beetles who were munching on the leaves. The interesting thing was that every JB that was actively eating, or, I presume, had been eating was acting strange. Most of the JB were hanging on only by one arm and one leg; the rest of their body was flailing in an effort to stay on the leaf. It was funny and satisfying because I interpreted this as the poison working. I dont wish death on anything, but I can make an exception for the JB; especially considering that it serves no purpose and offers no value to nature.

The JB that were fimly attached, and, I assume, not eating, I grabbed, threw to the floor and quickly ended their lives with my shoe.

My first impression is that the Sevin is working well. There are few JB attempting to feast on the leaves and those that do die quickly before much damage can be done. Most of the leaves are still green and healthy with little damage. The leaves outside of the grow tubes are starting to flourish, while the leaves inside the grow tubes are starting to die or turn odd colors (this fact convinced us to start taking the grow tubes off b/c eventually we will remove the leaves from the trunk anyways). I did still see activity in the vineyard from other insects and animals. I saw a few frogs and many spiders and flies. I was scared at first that the Sevin would drive the beneficial insects and animals away, but so far the impact has appeared to be minimal.

The negative to Sevin is the impact that it has on life in the vineyard. I found a few dead Ladybugs around the vines last weekend. I dont know whether their death can be attributed to Sevin, but it does seem like it could be more than a mere coincidence. I had hoped to maintain a healthy balance of pest and beneficial insect. I have no idea if the Sevin is driving beneficial insects away, which will lead to an influx of pests. I am also concerned about the Sevin getting into the ground and into the roots of the vines. The vines wont bear fruit for two more years, but I fear that there might be some lasting effects of using Sevin that show up in the fruit sometime down the road.

Overall we could not have made it through the summer without the Sevin. Later this summer we will apply some Milky Spore to try and kill as many grubs as possible to obviate the need for Sevin next summer. We will also experiment with Neem oil next year and see how that works.

Next up:

Pruning and training the vines.

July 5th

A wide shot of the vineyard with the first hang wire up and the grow tubes off the lowest row.

Another wide shot. The grass looks better from far away. Up close it is mostly crab grass.

We decided to leave the grow tubes off one row to see what happens. It may be time to let them breathe. Now we will find out if we have small or large animals that have been waiting patiently with baited breath.

A shot of the new wires. We put them 3.5 feet off the ground. Almost every vine can touch this first wire.

Here is a Gripple! A Gripple is a fencing tool that makes hanging wires and fencing a piece of cake. In this case, the wire can be pulled through the Gripple one way, but not the other. This makes tightening the wires simple and keeps the appropriate tension. You tighten the wires with a Gripple Fastening Tool (AKA Grippleator), which is as awesome as it sounds.

We drilled a small hole in each midpost to run the wire through. Some use staples because they want to be able to remove the wires during certain parts of the year. We are going for a more simple system.

This is the tallest vine. As you can see it is almost 6 feet tall.

Rain barrel number two. This area was home to a 3.5 foot black snake that we caught and released into the woods to the protest of one of Mother Nature's biggest detractors.

The PVC pipe coming out of the barrel is our intepretation of an overflow drain. In this case, excess water will be directed back into the original drain spout and into the french drain in the yard.

Water coming off the roof and into the gutters will now go into the rain barrel. There is a screen on the opening to keep out bugs and debris.

On Friday the rain barrel on the left side of the house filled up in 10 minutes. Now that filling them up is not a problem, we need to address the issue of storing all of this water somewhere to be delivered to the vines.

Rain barrel pictures

A picture of each rain barrel set up on a wood pedestal that was built to get them off the ground and make them more appealing to the eye. Next up is to connect them to the drain spouts.

Mother Nature's Answer to JB

I have read that the brightside to the seriousness of the Japanese Beetle problem is that a lot of money is being spent in R&D to counter these awful insects. It has been known for some time that certain pesticides like Sevin and Danitol could help save your plants by repelling JB and killing those that come into contact with it. However, the nice thing about the current trend toward organic and sustainable farming is that new research is providing environmentally neutral or less harmful ways to eliminate JB. In this vein have emerged two possible solutions to JB problems: Neem oil and Kaolin Spray.

Neem oil is a made from the Neem tree, which grows in parts of Asia. It is sold in a concentrate form and is diluted with water before application. A rough estimate is 1 ounce of 100 percent Neem oil per gallon of water. I have seen it sold in 70 and 100 percent concentrations and usually for 15-18 dollars per 16 ounces.

Neem oil makes a plant unappealing to JB and other various pests. If they do decide to eat the leaves, the Neem oil will affect their hormonal system. Neem oil will not immediately kill pests like a pesticide, but instead "both repels and disrupts their growth and reproduction" (http://www.neemfoundation.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=68&Itemid=74).

Neem is also helpful in keeping aphid populations under control, which affects ant populations and any other pest that enjoys the honey dew produced by aphids.

Along with pests, Neem is also helpful in controlling mildew and rot, which becomes an issue in humid climates once fruit is borne.

Kaolin spray is a mixture of water and kaolinite, which is a type of clay. This product is sold in powder form and is mixed with water before application. Kaolin spray applies a light clay coating on the leaves of a plant and this produces a barrier between insects and leaf and this barrier is enough to dissuade insects from eating or laying eggs on the leaves. Kaolin is obvious on plants because it leaves a milky white coating.

It is also suggested that Kaolin spray has a positive effect on keeping plants cool during hottest part of the summer. This is important because it allows the leaves to remain active longer and thus the plants can grow for longer periods of the day. Normally the plant would shut down during the hottest part of the afternoon.

Kaolin has no effect on pest populations directly and would probably need to be used - like most other repellants - in coordination with other pest management strategies.

I think that we will continue to use Sevin for the remainder of this season to combat JB. This should only mean for another month or so. We will keep our applications of Sevin to as few as necessary to keep the JB away. Next year we will make a more educated and environmentally sound choice of prevention for JB. So far we have only applied Sevin once on the vines and it has kept the beetles at bay. I imagine we will need to reapply at least twice more before the adults leave this earth.

Battle Royal Begins

So, I should have known that growing grapes would not be a walk in the park and, indeed, it is not. This fact was made painfully obvious this week with the arrival of the Japanese Beetle. This pest of pests is abundant across our farm and has taken notice of the 60 new grape plants and their shiny green leaves.

The Japanese Beetle is native to, wait for it, Japan and came to the US early last century through New Jersey (go figure). It has since spread throughout much of the East coast and West to the Mississippi river. The Japanese Beetle eats the leaves of several hundred plants and flowers in the US. They usually feed in groups like a feeding frenzy of sharks and also similarly, the presence of a few beetles eating usually attracts many beetles. Either the male or female produces a scent while eating, which attracts the opposite sex and so on and so on.

Our vineyard management crew worked tirelessly applying a soapy water mixture on the vines, but this proved to have no deterrent capabilities. Next, and this was a difficult decision, came the liquid Sevin. We had wanted to keep the vineyard free of all insecticides and pesticides, etc., but the thought of losing some or even most of our vines proved too difficult to swallow. Commence with the poison.

So far the results seem promising. Whereas yesterday we had several bugs on each plant, today there are only a few beetles on all plants.

The rest of the summer will be spent brainstorming options for long term treatment of the beetles.

Three Japanese Beetle damage shots and one shot of the growth to this point.

Paycheck Tasting 6-17-08

After an eventful night of bottling 30 bottles of Chardonnay, we were able to sit down with a bottle of Bordeaux. For the second installment of our paycheck tastings we opened the 2003 Chateau Lilian Ladouys from Saint - Estephe. Based on the location, this wine is mostly Cabernet Sauvignon with a distinct slant toward the "terrior".

Tasting Notes:

Mike: This wine had strong, obvious aromas of cherry, raspberry and an earthy leave component. Not so obvious, but much more interesting was the cola slurpee smell. In fact, it reminded me of the cola part of the cherry cola flavored popsicles that I bought at Wegmans.

The mouth feel was silky with strong tannins. The wine had a cherry sauce flavor with some Bordeaux earth and a familiar concrete dust finish. The other Bordeaux wines I've had have all had a concrete dust finish.

Overall, I enjoyed this wine. I dont know what the price was b/c John bought it, but i would guess in the ballpark of 15-20 bucks. For that price I would buy it in a pinch. It wont turn any heads, but it also wont piss you off b/c you spent 20 bucks. Unfortunately, you cant really find too many steals in Bordeaux under 20 bucks.

Score: 87

John: This wine started out a little slow and soft for me. Its appearance had good color and tannic structure but the bordeaux was very subtle and almost pinot-ish on the first taste and on the nose. After the initial pour I got a strong sense of raw cherries but not much else.

As it began to open up the wine became much more appealing to all the senses. I was still get a lot of cherries but it turned more to a candied sweet cherry than a natural one. I also started to get hints of tobacco, particularly those found in the wrapper of a good cigar. This was hinting more to the earthy sense that you would get from the region and varietal type of wine.

I got the same cherry and tobacco notes on the pallette with a good mouthfeel, but not as strong as I have gotten with some other full-bodied Bordeaux. I also got a hint of vanilla that I didn't get on the nose as well as a slight taste of garlic butter. On the finish I was getting a good dark chocolate taste that lasted well beyond the first tastes.

Overall, this was a good Bordeaux but I have also had better less expensive bottles. It was a 2003 so it did take a little longer to open up than the 2005 vintage. Overall not worth the price (Mike doesn't know it was in the $30+ range) but a decent wine non the less. Would pair well, like other Bordeaux, with Steak and other red meats or dishes heavy with spices.

Score: 89

New Pictures

Below are a handful of pictures taken in June 2008. These pictures show all of the hardwork and time we have put into this vineyard with our own HANDS and the help of some small machines and one tractor.

Here is the vineyard with the end post wires securely in the ground. You will also notice that all four driplines are up.

A shot of the four end posts and the dripline. We still need to tighten up the dripline at the end of the rows.

Rain barrels. These bad boys were purchased from the Culpeper County Government as part of their water conservation efforts. They were advertised as free, but let me tell you that they were not, in fact, free.

Here is a nice wide shot of the vineyard and the main house at Hall Manor. This is where our vineyard management team rests their heads when they are not hard at work in the vineyard.

Here two members of our deer patrol lie in wait for the chance to stalk any unfortunate deer that wander onto the property. Notice the strategic positioning that these well disciplined animals have taken allowing them a 360 degree view of the entire property. Impressive indeed.