It was cool to see the first flowers of 2016 yesterday – even more-so to have the ‘buzzing’ accompaniment of the hover-flies too. I only had my phone with me, so I’m doubly impressed by this result!

This picture was taken in the southern Beaujolais Villages area – but truth be told it’s a semi-fake! These gamay vines are actually in a nice ‘garden’ in the city of Villefranche – the commercial capitol of the Beaujolais region – so they are not really in a ‘true’ vineyard area.

But they are real flowers – the outliners for the vignoble. They are a few days ahead of the ‘real vineyards’ as the city has a temperature advantage versus the vineyards – and remained ‘frostless’ this year. But yesterday was 28°C in the Beaujolais, so the real ‘floraison‘ is clearly not far away…

[EDIT:]The first flowers reported in a real Burgundy vineyard today by Jean-Philippe Bret in (chardonnay) Pouilly-Vinzelles!