When the climate is not favorable in Bordeaux all of us refer to a "difficult" vintage. However, in order to avoid all misunderstanding, one must realize that in this case the word “difficult” simply refers to the “difficulty” of the amount of work and decisions that the vintner must face in order to obtain the best results in an unhelpful context.
A particularly mild and humid winter and spring will provide very favorable conditions for certain diseases. Due to such conditions, this year we needed to be extremely vigilant, working around the clock, in order to permit the grapes to ripen under the best possible conditions. Never have our tractors rolled up and down the vineyard so often to protect the vines and their fruit. Never have we needed so many workers to apply the tasks (that only human knowledge can accomplish) that would help us to obtain the best results. First, already at the end of June, we began with the thinning of leaves on the northern side; next came green picking that lightened the load on the vine stock while also maneuvering to better aerate the remaining bunches; and finally, in August, came a second meticulous thinning to favor the remaining grapes.
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Harvesting of the white grapes began on August 28th. Just to give you an idea of the masses of extra work necessary with a difficult vintage, note that we usually pick the whole crop of white grapes in one week with 50 people. In 2007 two weeks and 100 pickers were needed to harvest the white grapes on only 6 hectares.
The picking of the whites took place under a blazing sun permitting a calm and serene harvest time during which the red grapes were allowed to finish their maturing.
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Then came Monday, September 17th – the whites were finished and the technical team met once more to decide just what to do about the reds. Having learned of a menacing weather report but also having a quest to obtain a maximum maturity for our grapes, one rather ironic phrase evolved from their discussion: "We must hurry, but do so slowly!"
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We began picking the red grapes on September 18th with an additional 80 pickers added to our team. This totaled up to more than 200 people, including those who work on salary for us, who were mobilized to start in on the harvesting of the black Merlots.
This exceedingly impressive number of participants was necessary this year more than any other as a very severe sorting and choosing needed to already be done on the vine. Only the experienced picker is capable of selecting in the most useful and quality-guided manner which grapes are perfectly sound and ripe. Only those are permitted to enter our chais. Three weeks were needed to bring in all the red grapes which added up to an interim of six weeks since we began gathering the whites. To say the least, never in memory have we spent so much time and united so much energy and work for the harvesting of one vintage.
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