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| The beginning of flowering (Seyval) |
Flowering has at last started on the vineyard, with most of the Chardonnay and Seyval showing around 25% flowers. The Pinots are a bit behind but with the current warm weather we hope that most of the vineyard will be in full flower the end of the weekend. The vines are several weeks behind their normal growth cycle because of the cold weather earlier in the year.
This is a critical time on the vineyard; immediately after flowering comes pollination and fruit set which is a major factor in determining how much how much fruit we will harvest later in the year. Vines pollinate themselves and for this to happen effectively we need a period of warm dry weather. For the last two years our summers have been wet and windy which meant that many of the grapes weren't fertilised properly. This resulted in straggly bunches which the French call Coulour or Millerandage.
Fingers and everything else crossed for the hot weather to last for a few more weeks.
The late start seems to have homogenised flowering for my diverse varieties. Here in west London, the ground temperature hit 40 on sunday. I have further boosted this by 2 degrees by installing a windbreak to the prevailing wind, and am in the process of laying down stones in the beds, on top of the weed control fabric and bark chips, adding storage heating to weed and moisture control.
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