What's Up in the Vineyard?

Owl Boxes

You can now see owl boxes 

scattered among our 15 acres of vines

and rising 12 feet into the air. 

Why?

Varmints! 

Gophers love vineyards as much as golf courses
and, unlike Bill Murray in Caddyshack,
we like to find more natural methods
to balance out the ecosystem.

Gophers burrow under vines
munching on roots
and will kill younger vines.

So earlier this year,

T. fired up the power tools
and played with the plywood.

Starting with one box,

he ended up with six ...

... and raised them 
like the flag at Iwo Jima
throughout the vineyard
where they stand sentinel 
over spring roses and grape shoots.

"If T. builds them, will they come?"

A pair of barn owls, like this one,
can consume 2,000 rodents a year ...
but only if they like the neighborhood
and the new condos. 
Was this going to be another real estate boondoggle?

One dusk night, however,

our friends, Chris and Jennifer Will,
(Jennifer volunteers at a peninsula bird sanctuary)
released a rehabilitated barn owl at Satori
and our fingers were crossed
that it would take up residence ...
and bring its friends.

The Proof is in the Pudding.

Or in the bird droppings,
and the hairball-like things
-- called pellets --
 they regurgitate
after a nosh of gopher sushi.

Barn Owls and Western Screech Owls.

How do we know we have both types?
In the middle of the night
you can hear the eerie screech of the latter
and the crisp, loud clicking of the former.
Haunting, actually,
because you rarely see them in flight;
you just hear fast-moving sounds
of predators in the darkness.

4 out of the 6 vacancies are filled!

And springtime means raptor babies (we hope).
Each night we go to bed
knowing that our vines and tomatoes
have a much better chance now of surviving to harvest
thanks to our newest bird buddies. 


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What's Up in the Vineyard?

Springtime, which means Bud Break!

Looking West over the Satori vineyards 
toward the Santa Cruz Mountains 
and a tempestuous spring sky.
 Lots of rain in April (after a dry winter) and things 
are literally pushing and popping all over the vineyard.

In late February, you may remember, 
we removed and burned about 200,000 "canes" (last year's growth) 
from our nearly 10,000 estate vines.

 Then, in early April, all sorts of tiny buds 
started to erupt -- Bud Break! -- from the spurs
on the roughly-pruned vines.

While Buds Break Horse and Dog could care less.
Wonder (the wonder horse) fancies grass.
Easy prefers mining for gophers.

Adorah (Sandy) and T.  eyeball some new Merlot buds.

Looking toward the Winery 
from a quadrilateral-trained Merlot vine. 
Quadrilateral means four horizontal cordons, 
each with five or six spurs. 





Circle of Life.
  Ideally, each spur has two buds ... 
which become two shoots ... 
which become two cluster-carrying vines ... 
which, after harvest, become two canes. 

But grape vines are extraordinarily prolific
scoffing at the viticulturist's
  best-laid plans 
for an orderly
two buds per spur.
Someone has to come by
and pinch off these tiny interlopers
(over and over and over)
lest the vineyard become an over-grown chaos by June.

Buds appear everywhere
  on the trunk
on the undersides of cordons
and all over spurs.
T. likens the second pruning of vines
to painting the Golden Gate Bridge.
As soon as you finish one pass,
you go back and do it again ...
until the vines finally give in
and get down
to some serious 
two vines per spur grape production.

Young Merlot in training.
  Sometimes, for various reasons, you have to replace a vine,
like this one, which is being trained
to conform to its quadrilateral trellis.
Green tape signals the trainer/pruner
to proceed carefully when pinching buds
to avoid loss of a year's growth.

So here it is May 3.
  Buds have become shoots,
growing an inch or more each day.
The leaves on the shoots increase photosynthesis
giving the vine the energy to produce the coming fruit.
You can already see
tendrils reaching for trellis wires
and nascent clusters of grapes.
(More on this, soon, when we talk about flowering and setting.)

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