We started the harvest The first harvest was the Viognier on Saturday... 9 hours work straight from 5am to 2pm. Luckily it was not too hot. We got 3 bins which is about 1 ton of grapes or 2 barrels of juice. Les vendanges ont commencé La première vendange a été le Viognier Samedi dernier... […]

Growing Grapes The grapes are growing fast and we might actually have a lot if the wind doesn't blow them away, if the sun doesn't burn them, and if the birds don't eat them. Le raisin pousse Les grapes de raisin poussent vite et nous devrions en avoir beaucoup si le vent ne les souffle […]

Nematodes We have nematodes, tinny worms that eat vine roots, so to fight them, I'm adding more...But those are predatory nematodes, aka carnivores, and will feast on the bad ones...and other bugs by laying eggs in them. That's better than chemicals. Nématodes Nous avons une infestation de nématodes, de petits vers qui mangent les racines […]

WWOOFers WWOOFing at CHV WWOOF stands for World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms, or Willing Workers on Organic Farms and is a hospitality service operated by a loose network of national organizations that facilitate homestays on organic farms. We got our two wwoofers at the beginning of the month to help us with all our […]

Robot and CHV Finally Wall-Ye is here. It suffered a bit from the trip to here, but it is now functional. I called it Arthur like in the movie "Passengers" (Jennifer Lawrence & Chris Pratt - 2016), although it doesn't talk much. Not at all as a matter of fact. But it is very useful. […]

Harvest is over We finished the harvest last Monday, with the help of my fellow firefighters volunteers, just before it started raining again. There were few encounters, 2 rattlesnakes revealed by Diva, and a tarantula. Nobody got hurt, except the snake that became appetizer for dinner. The grapes are very nice this year, although we […]

Harvest time We had a crazy weather here, and the sugar is going up very quickly in the grapes. We harvested the Muscat at 30 Brix, and the Viognier at 24.6 yesterday. Tomorrow we'll harvest the Syrah and the Tempranillo. I give a big thank to the fire department who came and helped for free […]

Water in the desert is not for everybody There would be enough water if everybody was to share, but big companies using the golden rule (the one with the gold make the rule) have decided differently. Enjoy the water you have today as you may not have any tomorrow. The worst is that Vines use […]

Snakes Galore With the monsoon starting and the rain pouring, snakes are coming out every where. We saw a big Diamond-Back Rattlesnake (Crotalus atrox - Venomous) and later a big Gopher Snake (Pituophis Catenifer - Non Venomous) in the vineyard. Both had a length of about 5 feet. Both are enemies and if they meet, […]

Our vines have flowers: Some of our vines already have flowers (The Grenache). Nos vignes ont des fleurs: Certaines de nos vignes ont déjà des fleurs (Le Grenache).