There were many producers holding their breath last night, and will probably be doing the same tonight – it reached -2.2°C at 05h30 this morning.
The fact that it is dry gives a little more latitude, so the vines can better resist the cold, but still at -3°C the new leaves and shoots on those vines will be damaged. If the vineyard was more damp, they can really only tolerate -1.5°C! The forecast is for similar tonight. Apparently two nights last week were also equally worrisome.
It’s actually unusually dry in the vineyards, in one of the pictures below, you can see the workers of William Fevre having to water the new vines they planted last week in Grand Cru Preuses – otherwise they would die – pretty-much unheard of in April. On the other hand, lucky for them that they didn’t yet have to heat the vineyards or spray water to protect the vines. Spraying water is a double-edged sword; it’s effective, but once you start spraying you may have to do it more often…
