A Greenhouse Record

The normal fall sequence of events is we wait until frost is imminent in early October, scramble to push everything inside and back into the greenhouse. But because a single layer of tempered glass doesn't keep it warm enough for tropical plants through a Missouri winter, an extra layer of poly film is needed. When it gets really cold in November, we painstakingly wrestle with ladders and wrangle the extra poly film over and around all of the plants, usually with plenty of swearing. Often, tall children are employed. 

This year we're trying something different. Nothing has gone back into the greenhouse yet. Arguably some plants should, as we've had lows in the upper 40s a couple of nights now. But this weekend we decided to try getting the poly up early. This has the advantage of allowing better movement of people and ladders. It worked well. In fact, no children were used in the application of the 2020 poly film, and it's up earlier than ever. 

2020 Wines - Chapter 4 - Frontenac

 As with Foch, the Frontenac yield was low this year. We pulled in 87#, less than half of last year. It's another high TA, high pH wine. Crush and destemming yielded 8.8g of must, with TA crazy high at 22, pH 2.80. Double salt technique with 175g calcium carbonate brought pH up over 4.0, not ideal for fermentation. I added back tartaric to get pH to fermentation-compatible 3.38, but will admit that I'm somewhat out of my league with these numbers. As for sugar, 1.084 came to 1.090 with minimal 350g sugar. Used Opti Red and Booster Rouge but as with Foch, no enzymes. 

Pitched yeast 8/16, VP41 co-innoculated 8/17. Pressed off 8/22 to get 6.5g. To it, I added Enartis Tan Uva, 7.6g. This is much higher (triple) than the recommended dose, yet lower than the recommended dose of the unfortunately similarly named Uva Tan from Scott Labs. I just decided to split the difference and see what happens. 

2020 Wines - Chapter 3 - Foch

The 2019 Foch will be drinkable with decent color. We're trying some new techniques described here to preserve the color in 2020. 

Harvest brought in 51#, far less than the ~200# last year. Dancing Man kept some of the critters away, but we still lost 1/3-1/2 of the crop to critter losses. The yield this year was lower as well, probably due to a late frost. I calculated the TA at 17, pH 2.98. Crush and destem yielded over 5g of must. I treated with 50ppm SO2, then used the double salt technique 61g calcium carbonate to get TA to 10, pH 3.8. I added back some tartaric to get the pH to 3.41. 1.076 + 488g sugar to get to 1.090. Opti Red and Booster Rouge but no enzymes. 

I pitched yeast 8/16, VP41 8/17, then pressed 8/22 and immediately added 2.8g Enartis Tan Uva. Wound up with 3.5g plus a bottle for topping. Some oak cubes will help finish MLF. 

Harvest Day

Days actually. I picked 120# of Chambourcin by myself on Thursday. Then on Sunday we crushed the Chambourcin and picked, crushed, and pressed 400# of Vidal.

Chambourcin

That's about half

Big clusters

Lisa happily pressed all of it

Crush pad