A quick update on the situation in the vines, courtesy of David Clark in (of-course) the Côte de Nuits:
The vines are looking far too good at the moment. I’m doing the green harvest and haven’t found a single botrytised berry yet – plenty time for that to change, of course! I’m looking at harvest maybe the weekend of the 19th, weather permitting, although many will be earlier.
Naturally we need a Côte du Beaune-er for balance – here’s Etienne de Montille’s view:
So far so good for the coming 09 vintage.
Though it was a bit tough for organic growers, we could manage the mildew that was the main difficulty during the season. Grapes look great and well set (normal yield – maybe shorter in white) and nicely shaped grapes well set on the vine. No rot so far…
If we don’t have too much rain, we are pretty optimistic… another vintage in 9 🙂
It’s actually raining today in the Côtes and the forecast is for a couple more days too, but generally the mood is positive, but let’s think only of the sun…
Peter Palmetshofer, a long term correspondent and occasional organiser of great wine dinners shared with me (and you) these pictures of Mickey the horse in Romanée-Conti from last weekend – when there was plenty of sun!
Peter: Date/time was Saturday 1. August, 9:40 exactly. Normally ploughing is finished earlier not to hurt the berries, but due to the wet weather the weeds are growing that fast, producers working with herbicides will have serious problems in 2009, thats for sure. Mickey is gourmand, as you can see some Romanée Conti leaves on his muzzle. Correct description would be Mickey working with Monsieur Denis, that’s for sure. But it was Mr Denis who authorized me to enter RC.
