Yesterday in the Blaye wine region, North of Bordeaux, Eric Bantegnies, owner of a 60 hectare property, La Bertinerie, began harvesting red wine grapes between the raindrops.
"This is my 21st harvest. 2007 and 2008 are definately the most complicated vintages so far, perhaps due to the fact that these are both 13 moon years - this will also be the case for 2009..."
A painful season : rainy cold weather over the past few months, with showers during harvestime makes 2008 a vintage, like 2007, a difficult birth. However, Eric is optimistic : "The grapes are ripe and we are making a careful selection to irradicate any rotten berries."
The yield will be small, as in the rest of France. This will automatically increase production costs. "Our property consists of around fifty distinct plots. It is in vintages like this one that the best "terroirs" (soils, micro-climates) and producers technical savoir-faire can make a real difference. A far cry from 2000 and 2005 which were easy vintages for everyone," explains Eric, who is already planning which plots will be used in which wine.
The property offers a range of wines at three price levels : 6, 8 and 10 euros per bottle.
Lyre training : At La Bertinerie, the 17 hectares of white grapes were harvested between the 15th and 24th September. The red harvest has now begun for this late harvest vintage. Everything is picked by hand here, even though 80% of French vineyards are now machine picked.
This property has a particularity unique to this region : all the vines are lyre trained. "This method of training the vines' two main stems into a "V" shape offers a number of advantages, the main advantage being early ripening, reassuring for the producer. But this method requires specific machinery and there is not enough space between the vines for harvesting machines to operate."
Machine harvesting remains however an attractive idea to Eric, especially when : "This morning, without warning, six harvesters did not turn up for work. This manual harvest will cost almost 60,000 euros in wages and social security costs in contrast to the price of a harvesting machine : 120,000 euros, paying itself off in 5 years."
Moreover, these modern machines are efficient and flexible and, in blind tastings, it is often very difficult to distinguish between a manually or mechanically picked wine.
A total of three weeks harvesting is planned at La Bertinerie, spread out over one and a half months. On the best weather days, 80 pickers will be at work in and amongst the vines.
Just like a small army..
César Compadre
doc@sudouest.com
S.O. 07/10/08
Translated by Maxine Colas.