The 2007 Vintage

The harvest this year was the earliest in Margaret River’s viticultural history, so early in fact, the grapes beat the new wine barrels to the winery.

In Margaret River we generally have wet and windy conditions during spring, which means the vines have a protracted period of flowering lasting three to four weeks, or longer.

Spring 2006 produced little wind or rain and the result was that flowering finished in little more than a week. This affected all varieties and translated into even ripening and median harvest dates were brought forward by seven to 14 days.

Although winter rainfall was down slightly, good rains in spring and early summer meant that the vines had a good season with plenty of moisture as they approached maturity.

Flavour development and acid retention were excellent. Temperatures were generally mild until the Australia Day long weekend when we had the first of three heat spikes. Luckily these did not affect quality, with which we are very pleased.

Yields for Chardonnay were well up but Semillon and Sauvignon Blanc balanced this by being down and Cabernet Sauvignon was almost exactly average.

The Chardonnay yield of 8.64 tonnes/hectare gave a total production of 21 tonnes (including the School Fees Block), which beat the previous record crop of 17.9 tonnes, recorded in 1991. However, this latter wine is really the record holder because the School Fees had not been planted and there were very significant losses to birds. We can only imagine how high yields would have been with bird nets in place.

Across the board, grapes showed lively zesty aromatics and generous flavours with the sauvignon blanc capturing all its marvellous zippy green notes. The reds are sporting good flavours and tannin ripeness. Birds have been more of a problem than usual with voracious attacks causing the nets to go on earlier than usual. As the nets were put on the School Fees Block, the birds tried to dive through them. Once the red gums got into full bloom the pressure eased.

The red varieties provided a similar mixed bag of yields. Pinot Noir was excellent and had to be heavily crop thinned to ensure that quality was not diluted. Merlot, which is nearly as temperamental at flowering as Chardonnay, responded to the good conditions with well-filled bunches. Both have produced excellent wines.

Generally mild conditions meant that the cabernet slowly developed flavour ripeness until the third heat spike brought things to a swift conclusion.

As is the way of nature, we moved from a state of inertia (well almost), waiting patiently for the cabernet harvest, to picking frantically to get all the fruit off at the optimum.

The situation with yield was variable, with the Old Block, Ribbon Vale and some of the new cabernet plantings yielding well while the Short Rows and Long Rows Blocks were very much down. The same situation occurred with the vineyards supplying the Amy’s Cabernet Sauvignon. Yields on Ian Bell’s Glenmore Vineyard were well down but Max Montgomery’s were average. The good news is that Keith believes the cabernet sauvignon looks fantastic.

Finally, the Petit Verdot, the latest ripening of all the varieties, was probably the biggest winner from the early season and matured beautifully, producing deep and complex wines.