Well not quite a weekly post but nearly.

Growth in the vineyard has commenced in earnest.  As the vines head towards flowering in 3 - 4 weeks, growth needs to be concentrated into those shoots which have the emerging bunches on them and not those with no bunches.  This is also the time to remove any clutter of shoots by thinning out any doubles arising from a bud, shoots in the wrong place as well as those without bunches.  This operation is called shoot thinning and is very slow and laborious but extremely important.  It ensure there is good ventilation within the canopy as well as good bunch exposure.
The Viognier vines have had a very even budburst, especially those on the ‘arched canes’, that is where the canes are not laid down along the wire but ‘arched’ up to ensure the middle of the caner is higher than either the end or the crown of the vine.  This together with cracking the cane at wrapping down time ensures a more even budburst with no big gaps and a slightly increased crop level.

What was also tried this year was to wrap some canes flat along the wire but to significantly crack them while wrapping down to see if it improved the budburst percentage.  The result is shown below where I think it had a strong affect.

The Merlot block is spur pruned with spurs already well spaced along the cordon.  The shoort thinning involves removing any doubles, any extra shoots other than the two on each spur that were left at pruning as well any major cluttering of shoots.

This shows a vine before any thinning with some clumps of shoots which would create problems later.

This is the same vine with only the shoots with bunches retained on each of the spurs.  Quite a difference.  When one looks along the row to view the result of the thinning it looks like this.  Lots of shoots having been discarded.

Oh, yes that’s Pippa the wonder dog just lazing about while I do all the work!

Ciao for now from Vineman