Quixote Vineyard Under Cover

The Napa Valley in winter can fool you. The vines may be asleep, the roadways empty, but don’t be deceived. The valley in winter is alive.

And so goes the paradox that is viticulture and winemaking.

The evidence lies beneath the naked vines. This is the season of regeneration, when dormant vineyards give birth to a different kind of life - the cover crop.

Sustainability is the gospel growers up and down the valley are preaching, the demand today to give back to the land as much as we take out.

Drive into the valley this week and you’ll see acres of yellow mustard and wild flowers and vegetation ranging from fava beans to sweet peas. You’ll see sheep grazing between the rows of petite syrah and cabernet, dispensing the need for gas-powered mowers. Look closely enough and you’ll see the foundation being set for the next vintage.

At Quixote, we farm our Stags’ Leap Ranch organically and one of the keys to that approach is the introduction of a diverse set of cover crops each winter, their ultimate payoff a rich, living soil we believe translates into expressive fruit in the bottle.

Cover crops aid by increasing the nitrogen content of the soil, improving water penetration, creating organic matter that is returned to the soil and reducing dust which eliminates some pests.

Our vineyard manager, Michael Wolf, has planted everything from red oats to purple vetch to two varieties of peas.

“What we’re trying to do is to make sure we have no erosion on our slopes and to provide a natural form of organic matter to the soil,’’ Wolf said. “Sustainability and organic have become synonymous in wine-speak, but they are not. You can make an argument for calling just about anything you do sustainability and some do.
“But organic farming limits the kinds of material you can use in the vineyard, specifically chemicals. We only use materials certified for organic production.’’

What does this mean to our wines? In the short term, consistency. In the long term a vitality we hope lends our wines a sense of place.

“By farming organically, we’re trying to have the fruit more closely lined up with the soil for a better expression of the site,’’ Wolf said. “We want to apply a lighter hand and the cover crops a part of that.’’

And, hey, in the meantime they conspire to create a beautiful winter landscape.

Lew Price

Click here to view more Quixote cover crop photos.

By Lew Price on February 29, 2008 2:09 PM | Permalink | Comments ( 1 )