Harvest timing with 30 mm of rain in the forecast
You manage 8 ha of dry-farmed Pinot Noir in a cool maritime valley: 20-year-old Pommard and 777 on a south-facing slope at 170 m. Veraison finished on 20 August. It is now 8 September. Yesterday's lab: 21.5 °Brix, pH 3.32, TA 8.6 g/L. The canopy is dense - a wet June pushed laterals and the second leaf-removal pass never happened. In the lowest-yielding block, about 15% of clusters are tight-berried and a few show weeping pinkish-brown spots. Forecast: 30 mm of rain over three days from 11 September, then ten dry days at 24 °C, 8 °C nights and heavy morning fog. Your picking crew is free 9-10 September only, then booked elsewhere until 20 September. Cash is tight and last year's wine is due to be bottled this month.
1. Recommend a picking date or a split pick, and defend it. Address both what you lose by picking early and what you risk by waiting.
Read the worked answer
Split the pick - do not treat the vineyard as one decision.
- 9-10 September (now): take only the low-yielding block with tight clusters and weeping spots. It carries nearly all the botrytis risk: tight berries trap water, the spots are already wounds, and 30 mm plus fog gives long leaf wetness with poor drying. Losing 15% of one block is survivable; losing it to grey rot and having it spread at sorting is not.
- 20 September: leave the loose-clustered, healthy blocks hanging. Ten dry days at 24 °C with cool nights will add roughly 1.5-2.5 °Brix and drop TA, which is exactly what 21.5 °Brix / 8.6 g/L needs. Picking everything now locks in a lean, green, high-acid wine and throws away the best ripening window of the year.
- The binding constraint is labour, not fruit. Book a crew for 20 September today; if none exists, that - not the weather - is the argument for picking more now.
- Insurance: walk the blocks on 12 September. If infection has jumped beyond the tight-cluster block, reassess immediately.
2. What can you actually do in the field between now and 20 September to protect the fruit you leave hanging?
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- Fruit-zone leaf removal, one side only, immediately. Do it now, not after the rain: wounds need to heal and the point is airflow plus spray penetration. Leave the west/sun-exposed side alone at 24 °C to limit sunburn and acid burn-down.
- Sanitation, not just protection. Drop visibly infected clusters into a bin and carry them out of the row - not into the middles where they sit as inoculum. Cut the weeping clusters out whole.
- Check the pre-harvest interval of any botrytis material before applying. Most are protectants and 30 mm will partly wash them, so do not spend money on a spray that cannot survive the event; spend it on the crew.
- No irrigation, no nitrogen, no hedging that pushes new growth. Keep the vines in check and the canopy open.
- Plan a second sorting pass at the crush pad for 20 September - it is cheaper than sorting in the fermenter.
3. The held fruit comes in on 21 September at 23.8 °Brix, pH 3.48, with about 8% of clusters showing grey rot. How does that change your fruit handling and your ferment plan?
Read the worked answer
Sorting becomes the winemaking decision; everything after it is secondary.
- Two-stage sorting: whole-cluster sort first (pull rot out before the destemmer smears it), then a berry or optical sort. Do not whole-cluster ferment this fruit - stems plus rot is a bacterial and acetic risk.
- Protect against laccase and oxidation. Botrytis laccase keeps working in must and is not stopped by normal SO2 doses. Keep the must cool, add SO2 at crush rather than later, minimise oxygen pickup, and accept that the wine will brown more easily in the first days.
- Keep lots separate. Ferment the clean fruit as the reserve lot; the rot-affected fraction goes to a separate tank so a problem stays in one place rather than the whole cellar.
- Manage nutrition and temperature actively - this fruit is more stressful to yeast, so add nutrients in two doses and hold 24-26 °C.
- Reset expectations. The 21.5 °Brix fruit from 9 September and this 23.8 °Brix fruit are now two different wines; blend on the bench, not in the tank.