This is the week that marks the outliners of veraison – the first berries are changing colour.

There’s been a consistent delivery of rain across the summer – actually dryness that has been punctuated by rain – sometimes heavy, causing short-lived rivers on vineyard paths. That said, coming from a Springtime deficit of rain, the Côte d’Or is now just below or already above the long-term rainfall average – it just depends on the village. Despite many stormy incidents and plenty with hail in the region. the vines have, so far, avoided new incidences.

So far it’s not really been a hot year – plenty of days have exceeded 30°C but there have been many cooler days too. This mix of warm and humid then cooler is keeping the risk of mildew high and oïdium remains an issue. Even a little botrytis can be found – but it’s too late for any treatment for the latter. The last treatments before the harvest will depend on the approach to viticulture of individual domaines but some have already made their last treatments before heading for their summer holidays and others will probably spray for the last time next week.

To date, the general timing of maturity in 2021 still resembles the trio of vintages; 2019, 2016 and 2012.

And, the best thing to do on a rainy Saturday in Beaune:

Today the weather is changing in Burgundy and once more for the worse.

The growers had been hoping for a couple of weeks of dry weather to rid themselves of the growing issue of downy mildew (right) even powdery mildew in some places too. Here are the main differences.

It seems that, for now, it’s going to stay wet and cool – the rain arriving today and holding station until at least Sunday. Whilst mildew is relatively under control in the Côte d’Or and Hautes Côtes, you don’t even need to get out of the car to spot strongly affected areas of vines in the Côte de Chalonnaise.

Coupled with the rain we have, once more, cooler temperatures too – this week, the forecast suggests that we will hardly break 20°C. At least the cooler temperatures are keeping the threat of oïdium under control though it’s still more prevalent than 1 week ago. From the perspective of weather, this is going to be a very different vintage to those of last 5 years. For now, the pacing of the maturity has retarded from 2012 to more like 2016 – so currently three weeks later than 2020 – but it’s likely to speed up in the areas where the yields are smallest – a lower yield ripening much faster than a higher one.

We are still probably about 2 months from the harvest, but the habitually earlier pickers tell me that their smaller yielding parcels might be ready to pick around Monday the 6th of September. I’ll keep you posted.

Yesterday was just another day in the waves of storms that we’ve seen at home for a week, or more. Hail caused some damage to the leaves of many garden plants – my pinot noir a little too. But my garden was relatively untroubled compared to about 25 km away in the Emmental where the hail-stones were much larger – they killed storks in their nests on the rooftops – 15 juveniles and even 2 adult birds too.

Not a good day…

Pouilly-Vinzelles, today…

Just 2 days ago, Solutre & Pouilly(-Fuissé) were badly hit by hail. I managed to take a tour of the vines while visiting today.

Much damage was done to the leaves and to what grapes there were – even the wood of the thicker stems was badly bruised and often snapped off towards the end of the branches. Yesterday, it didn’t look too bad as everything was still green, today the browning of the impact points had begun and I’m sure it will look even worse tomorrow.

The hail really came in a band and was accompanied by a high wind that exacerbated the damage – it just so happens that (in and around Fuissé) this band of weather followed the line of the new 1er Crus of Pouilly-Fuissé – and in only their second vintage too! As one vigneron of Fuissé described it today: “In some places there is no real drama, though we still have some effect from the hail, in other places it’s much worse and we wait for the official inspection. In these latter places, it’s clearly not just a case of this year’s losses but also how easy it will be to make our pruning for 2022 – some vines will clearly be complicated in this respect. You can see where there are puncture holes in the leaves there is generally damage to the grape clusters below too – and we’d only just, say 95%, finished the flowering too.”

Indeed, it wasn’t just a case of various grapelets taking direct impacts; the recently flowered ‘bunches’ when taking a hail impact usually break off completely or lose at least half their length – and, given the frosts of April, there was so little potential yield in the first place.

At least in Vergisson they had some luck and were not touched – but then they have already lost about 80% to the frost so…

2021 is not for the faint-hearted vigneron – particularly, so far, the producers of whites. Some images from today:

I thought I’d update you after this first image of the iris crop chez-moi this year. Two were missing in action this year – no blooms – but still a creditable 14 different ones this year. The yellows were the first and the last…

With all the seedlings, I’m running out of space for more.

A later flowering year but still a good year for them, without too much rainy weather over the flowering season – maybe I’ve another 10 days to enjoy the blooms before it’s all over for 2021…

Or just storms with some hail? It’s merely cloudy in Beaune right now, but in Gevrey:

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Recent vintages compared – each at the end of May – Chambre d’Agriculture, Côte d’Or

2021 So far:
– A year with reasonably cold winter temperatures followed by sunglasses and t-shirts in the vines in February/March.
– April turning colder then, for a few days, hotter, then heavily frosted – of note, many areas experienced an extra volume of vine-munching caterpillars.
– May was wet and cool
– Now it’s warming up again – and we could be moving into a rapid phase of growth for the vines – but they need it!
– The concerns over mildew are yet to be substantiated…

From the graphic above, ex Chambre d’Agriculture, Côte d’Or, this is (at the same date) five days behind even the 2013 vintage where many/most finished harvesting in October. There’s definitely some catching up to be done…