Warming up the vineyard at 4am!

Vineyard friends help us to light boujies in the middle of the night!

Visitors to the vineyard over recent weeks have been asking us what all the white tins positioned in between the vines are for. They are called boujies and are essentially large candles that we light on frosty nights to warm up the vineyard, and this week we had to use them!

Bud Burst

Last Saturday night temperatures fell towards zero resulting in our weather station sending us a text message at around 1am to warn us that temperatures were dropping. The vines are currently at the 'bud burst' stage and are vulnerable to frost at this time. Although no damage will be caused to the buds at -1.1C, a temperature of -2.2C will cause a '10% kill' of the buds and -3.8C will lead to a '50% kill'. 




Nick and friends came up to the vineyard to start lighting the boujies as soon as the warning came through, and they managed to stop the temperature falling below -1.3C. This is good news as the buds are fairly resilient up to around -1.9C at this stage.

So think of us on frosty nights - we will try to limit our wine comsumption and be early to bed!