Closeup of tiny wine grapes forming on the vineIt’s Bloom! Despite our earlier handwringing, bloom is pretty much on schedule now. We called 50% bloom at Winderlea on June 10th and at Worden Hill Vineyard on June 12th. Depending on your winemaking style, harvest will begin from 100 to 110 days later. We’re usually about 100 days because we like higher acidity and somewhat less ripening. The fruit for our sparkling wine may be picked even earlier so that we have high acidity, lower aroma and flavor compounds, and lower sugar (which converts to alcohol).  So, where does that put us for our still wines? Well, at 100 days, we would expect to start picking Winderlea Vineyard on about September 18th and Worden Hill Vineyard on about September 20th. This is just about typical. Our very first harvest in 2006 started on September 23rd. As always, a lot can happen in a hundred days but for now, things are shaping up nicely. More later…