Is the biggest story in our 2024 white blending that it's even scarcer than we thought? Or that we made a white version of Panoplie?

We spent three days last week around our blending table, working to turn the 32 different lots we made from our white grapes in 2024 into the blends and varietal bottlings we'll be releasing to you in coming months. There is good news, and bad. The good news is that what we tasted was of exceptionally high quality, so good that we're making, for the first time, a high-end white whose name we haven't yet decided on, to be the white wine equivalent of our Panoplie. The bad news is that not only was the 2024 vintage low in tonnage, particularly on whites, but the gallons of wine that we got per ton of grapes was lower than any year in our memory. I'll speculate some on why that might have happened below, but the take-home message is that we were nearly as scarce on whites as we were in the frost- and drought-impacted 2022 vintage. That constrained our choices somewhat and meant that it wasn't possible to make some longtime favorites. What did we make? And how did we decide what to put into the blends we'll be bottling over the coming year? Read on.

If you're unfamiliar with how we do our blending, you might find it interesting to read this blog by Chelsea that she wrote a few years ago. There wasn't much different that we did this year, but to help with the ambiance during a cool, showery spring week, we turned on the yule log setting on the TV that overlooks our blending table:

Our first step was to taste each variety in flights, give each lot a grade, and start assessing the character of the year. Our grading system is simple; a "1" grade means the lot has the richness, elegance, and balance to be worthy of consideration for Esprit Blanc. A "2" grade means we like it, but it doesn't seem like Esprit, for whatever reason. It may be pretty, but without the concentration for a reserve-level wine. It might be so powerful we feel it won't blend well. Or it might just be out of the style we want for the Esprit, such as with too much new oak. A "3" grade means the lot has issues that need attention. It might be oxidized or reduced. It might still be fermenting and in a place that makes it hard to evaluate confidently. Or it might just not have the substance for us to be confident we'll want to use it. Most "3" lots resolve into 2's or 1's with some attention. If they don't, they end up getting sold off and they don't see the inside of a Tablas Creek bottle. Then, we start from the top of our hierarchy and brainstorm possible blends, taste those blind against one another, and come to consensus. Once we've determined the blend and quantity for the wine at the top of our hierarchy, we set aside the lots that wine uses and look at what we have left for the next wine, and so on down the line. Finally, we taste everything we're going to make to be sure that each feels complete and individual. A snapshot of my notes highlights just how many 1's there were this year, and how few 3's:

In a normal year it takes us two days to taste through all the white lots. Not this year; we finished in one day. My quick thoughts on each variety are below. For context, in a normal year, for every 10 lots we might see three or four "1" grades, five or six "2" grades and one "3" grade. When we think a lot is right on the cusp between two grades, we can note that with a slash ("1/2", or "2/3"). As you'll see, in this year, more than half our lots got "1" grades and there was only one lot that anyone gave even a single "3" to. In rough harvest order:

• Viognier (4 lots): An outstanding Viognier vintage, with classic flavors, good richness, solid acids, and a lovely salty mineral note that provided balance to the fruit. I awarded three lots "1" grades and the other, which was still sweet enough I wasn't 100% sure what it would be like when it had finished fermenting, a "1/2".
• Grenache Blanc (8 lots): We saw a range of different styles of Grenache Blanc, from pure, pithy lots with classic green apple flavors and great length to some others that were showing a more golden color and some heaviness that I attributed to some minor oxidation. I gave four lots "1" grades, one other a "1/2", and three lots, which I found on the heavy side "2"s.
• Marsanne (3 lots): An outstanding Marsanne vintage as well, with all three lots showing Marsanne’s classic combination of gentle honeyed flavors, creamy textures, and a little pithy bite that provided focus. I gave all three lots "1" grades.
• Picardan (1 lot): Our lone Picardan lot showed nice brightness and a pretty note of sweet green herbs, but it didn't have a ton of length. I gave it a "1/2".
• Bourboulenc (2 lots): The best Bourboulenc showing we've had in our (admittedly short) six-year history. Both lots had the grape's signature bright preserved-lemon acids and rich, nutty texture. We didn't have any lots with orange weirdness we've seen in previous warm years. I gave both lots "1" grades.
• Clairette Blanche (2 lots): I was a little disappointed in our Clairette Blanche lots this year, as I thought the grape's expressiveness took a step back from the 2023 vintage. One lot was very low in acid, and reminded me of sake. The other was rich, with good acids, but a little heaviness and without the mineral note I look for in Clairette. I gave the first lot a "2" and the second a "1/2" as I thought it likely had just finished fermentation and the heaviness was due to some transitory oxidation.
• Picpoul Blanc (2 lots): Only two lots of Picpoul this year, but I loved them both. One was still a little sweet but with explosive acids and lovely tropicality, while the other was drier and added a lemongrass note to Picpoul's signature pineapple core and salty mineral flavors. Think a piña colada in a glass with a salted rim and you have an idea of what these Picpouls were like. I gave them both "1" grades.
• Roussanne (9 lots): In a year when we were hoping to make a high-end white based on Roussanne and still have enough Roussanne left for a beautiful Esprit Blanc it was a bit of shock to realize we had about 15% less quantity than we'd expected. But on the plus side of the ledger, all the lots were strong. I included the word "classic" in seven of my nine descriptions, and could have with the other two. All the Roussanne lots showed the honeycomb, lanolin, pear, and spice notes that the grape offers at its best. I gave five of the nine lots "1" grades. Three others got "1/2" grades because I was concerned about the amount of oak that they showed. And one lot got a "2"  because while it was rich and textured it was very low in acid and had a bite to the structure that we thought might not play all that well with other lots in a blend.

One goal that I had going into this blending was to make a high-end white. I've been getting requests for a few years now that we do so, but until recently we couldn't wrap our heads around what that wine would look like. We knew we wanted it to be based on Roussanne, as it really needs to be a collectible wine, and Roussanne is by far the most ageworthy white that we grow. But up through about 2019, we were making our Esprit de Tablas Blanc with 60%-70% Roussanne in most years. Short of making a 100% Roussanne, it was going to be hard to increase the Roussanne enough to differentiate it from the Esprit Blanc. And while we can look to the example at Beaucastel of their stellar 100% Roussanne Vieilles Vignes, we had our doubts about the wisdom of using a pure Roussanne as our top white wine given Roussanne's low acid profile in Paso Robles and the fact that we always feel like the Roussanne is improved by the addition of some of our higher-acid grapes like Grenache Blanc and Picpoul.

Two things have changed in recent vintages that pointed the way forward for this new wine. Since 2020, we've had a combination of hot years and low production on our Roussanne blocks that we weren't able to make an Esprit Blanc with 70% Roussanne even if we'd wanted to, at least not without using Roussanne lots that were not our favorites. So we've been choosing Esprit Blanc blends with percentages more around 40%-45%, and incorporating more of the fresher, higher-acid grapes. This has been made more exciting by the fact that since 2019 we've had the full collection of all six Chateauneuf-du-Pape whites in production. Our newer grapes (which include Bourboulenc, Clairette Blanche, and Picardan) have proven to be so good that we have incorporated all or most of them in our Esprit Blanc each year since 2020. The three have overall fresher profiles and lighter body than the trio of Roussanne, Grenache Blanc, and Picpoul Blanc we've used in Esprit Blanc since 2004. Their incorporation, along with our increasing love (and acreage) of Picpoul Blanc, has nudged the Esprit Blanc into a fresher, more aromatic, more tropical profile since 2020. We've liked that profile so much that we've decided to target it going forward, even when Roussanne is more plentiful. 

In the same way that we can differentiate our Mourvedre-led but not Mourvedre-dominated Esprit de Tablas from our Panoplie by increasing Panoplie's target percentage of Mourvedre to around 70%, the new Roussanne-led but not Roussanne-dominated profile of Esprit Blanc opens up the possibility of making a higher Roussanne percentage in an upper tier white blend, while still allowing us to incorporate some of the higher-acid varieties to make a wine that has both richness and balance. It also allows us to consider the inclusion of the United States' first-ever planting of Grenache Blanc, which we have all been raving over the past few years around the blending table. The idea behind this new high-end white is to lean into Roussanne's richness, rounded and deepened by a touch of oak, and make a wine that is luscious, textured, ageworthy, and memorable. 

So at the end of our day of tasting our white components we finished by brainstorming ideas for this new wine. We were only trying to make 300 cases this first year, so didn't need a ton of quantity, and identified three lots of Roussanne and one each of Grenache Blanc and Picpoul Blanc that we thought had the requisite character and intensity. As usual in a three-variety blend, we decided to start our blending process by making three test blends and having each one lean a little heavier into one of the three grapes to see what we learned. As often happens, it was clear that one of the three directions (the one that maxed out Roussanne at 75%) was the wrong way to go because the lower acid profile made the wine taste comparatively flat, but we split between options with Roussanne around 70% and greater amounts of Grenache Blanc and Picpoul. We tried a second round exchanging one Roussanne lot for another and ended up with a clear favorite, at 70% Roussanne, 25% Grenache Blanc, and 5% Picpoul Blanc. It had a powerful, textured, viscous mouthfeel, a lingering finish, and should only get better with another year in barrel. Now all we need is a name. 

That decided, we moved on to Esprit Blanc. Although Roussanne had recovered a bit from the punishingly low yields of 2022 and 2023, it was still going to be scarce. Making 1800 cases of Esprit Blanc (about 100 cases more than the minimum that we need to cover the things we use it for with our wine club, tasting room, wholesale and export) meant that realistically we were capped at about 40% of the grape. Given the scarcity and quality of grapes like Picpoul and Bourboulenc, we decided to dedicate all of both of these into all the blends, at 17% and 11% respectively. So in our first round of blending trials we decided to focus on whether we preferred a little more Roussanne (tasting wines that ranged between 34% to 40%), a little more Grenache Blanc (26% to 29%), or a little more of the lighter-bodied white grapes Picardan and Clairette (a combined 4% to 11%).

I loved all three options. The one that leaned into the lighter-bodied grapes (in our first glass) was pretty and minty, pure with good acid structure. The one that leaned into Grenache Blanc (in our second glass) was longer, with more structure but a little less charm. But the one that leaned into Roussanne (in the third glass) was a consensus favorite. For me it was a goldilocks wine: a little more richness than glass one, and a little more fun than glass two. The group agreed, and we had our winner: 40% Roussanne,  26% Grenache Blanc, 17% Picpoul Blanc, 11% Bourboulenc, 3% Picardan, and 3% Clairette Blanche. Our rule is always that the Esprit wines get first dibs on whatever lots they need to be great. This year, that means it got all of the Picpoul and Bourboulenc. So be it.

Looking at what we had left after setting aside two top wines made some options clear. We needed one more wine in enough quantities to send out to our entire wine club (meaning 600+ cases) and three others that needed to be in enough quantity to go out to our whine wine selection club (so mimimum 200 cases). The only way that those puzzle pieces fit together with the quantities we had left was to make a Grenache Blanc for the whole club and Cotes de Tablas Blanc, Viognier, and Marsanne for the White Wine Selection club. We only had about 250 cases surplus to those minimum quantities, and it could have been in any of the varietal wines or as Clairette Blanche or Picardan. So we decided to make the decision based on which Cotes Blanc we loved most. Cotes Blanc is always led by Viognier, but there have been years where Marsanne or Grenache Blanc approach Viognier in quantity. In our first round of test blending, we tried one wine that maxed out on our available Viognier (46%) and Grenache Blanc (22%), another that maxed out on our available Marsanne (36%), and another that maxed out on the lighter-bodied grapes Picardan (11%) and Clairette Blanche (10%). Somewhat to our surprise, the last wine got first place votes from seven of the eight of us around the table. The extra higher-acid grapes seemed to bring the stone fruit of the Viognier and the opulent honey character of the Marsanne to life. And sometimes that's the way it is: a lot that you didn't grade particularly highly on its own turns out to be just what another grape needs to shine.

So on Thursday we gathered to taste the seven estate wines that we made, plus the Patelin de Tablas Blanc and the one Lignée de Tablas white that we made: a blend of Marsanne, Grenache Blanc, Bourboulenc, and Roussanne from the Fenaughty Vineyard in the El Dorado AVA in the Sierra Foothills. A snapshot I took of the wines is below, complete with the post-it notes from our brainstorming names for our new white:

My brief notes on each wine are below, with the rough quantity we'll be bottling between now and the end of 2025:

• 2024 Grenache Blanc (775 cases): A pretty pithy nose, lightly tropical, with notes of cumquat and anise. The mouth is richly textured, but with great acids and flavors of caramel apple, salty minerals, and a little bite of green apple skin tannin on the finish. Classic Grenache Blanc, both charming and substantial.
• 2024 Marsanne (285 cases): A pretty nose of cantaloupe and citrus blossom, sweetgrass, chalk, and brioche. The palate is appealingly gentle: yellow plum, wet rock, fresh apricot, and sweet spice, all over a medium-bodied frame with gentle acids providing freshness and leaving a lingering flavor of pear tart. Lovely.
• 2024 Viognier (220 cases): An exuberant nose of jasmine, vanilla custard, and fresh peach. The mouth is classic Viognier but with a light touch: flavors of peaches and cream, sweet spices and a little minty lift. The wine's texture shines on the finish, which is long without ever being heavy.
• 2024 Patelin de Tablas Blanc (4500 cases, some of which will be diverted to boxes and kegs): A high-toned nose with tropical fruit and spice at the fore, showing notes of camphor, lemongrass, mandarin, and pineapple. The mouth shows kiwi and fresh apricot fruit, then bright pithy acids and chalky minerals. There is still a little more fermentation to come for this wine, but it's seriously appealing. I am excited that we have a solid supply of this!
• 2024 Lignée de Tablas Fenaughty Vineyard (390 cases): A nose of honey and brioche, herbal tea, spicecake, gardenia, and sweet cream butter. On the palate, mouth-filling with flavors of honeydew, guava, and preserved melon, medium body, and a wet rock minerality coming out on the finish. This will be the first Marsanne-based blend we've ever released, an it shows that character in a nice way. 39% Marsanne, 35% Grenache Blanc, 13% Bourboulenc, and 13% Roussanne.
• 2024 Cotes de Tablas Blanc (450 cases): A beautiful nose of peach and sweet green herbs, anise and chalky minerals. The palate is similar: white peach and wet stone, full and rich but with good minerality providing balance and a red apple note giving both sweet and tart aspects on the long finish.
• 2024 Roussanne (275 cases): Deep and powerful on the nose at this stage, with notes of cedar and honey. The mouth is textured and salty, with baking spices and a kiss of sweet oak. Powerful and dense, with structural elements at the fore rather than fruit at this stage, it will go into barrel for another year of aging.
• 2024 Esprit de Tablas Blanc (1815 cases): A gorgeous nose of passion fruit and green pear, honeysuckle and chalky minerals. The mouth is lifted and lovely, with flavors of baked pear and satsuma, white flowers and sea spray. The wine's texture shines on the long finish, with lively acids framing apricot fruit. I'm very happy with how this came out, and it has (for me) an ideal balance of substance and charm.
• 2024 To-Be-Named Blanc (305 cases): A powerful but lovely nose of caramel and honeycomb, nutmeg and white flowers. The mouth is intense and very Roussanne in character, with flavors of creme brulee and baked pear, a nice moderate dose of sweet oak, and appealing pithiness at the end that leaves a finish of lemon bar and salted butter. I can't wait to start sharing this with people.

A few concluding thoughts:

• Man, would we ever love a productive vintage, at least on the white side. This is now the third time in four years that we've averaged less than 2.8 tons per acre on our whites, and the fourth year in a row that both Viognier and Roussanne were below 2.4 tons per acre. In 2024, those numbers were way below: 1.4 tons per acre on Viognier and 1.6 tons per acre on Roussanne. And unlike most of our history, productive grapes like Grenache Blanc and Marsanne (both of which averaged at least 4.4 tons per acre every year between 2017 and 2020) haven't been stepping up to provide other options. We love our whites, and know that people look forward to them. While it's great to know that we're putting together enough to satisfy our wine club shipment needs, it's hard knowing that we're not going to have much beyond that. We do have about 20 acres of whites planted over the last three years but not yet in production. That cavalry can't arrive soon enough.
• On a related note, it seems like the heat of the vintage impacted the wine in a very specific way. It wasn't, as you might expect, that we saw higher sugars or lower acids. In fact, sugars were a little lower than they were in 2023, and pH only modestly higher. But as I mentioned briefly in our intro, we saw significantly lower yields of juice per ton of grapes than we expect. Typically we use 155 gallons/ton as our placeholder, knowing that some thicker-skinned, smaller grapes (think Viognier, or Roussanne) usually produce yields a bit below that, while larger, thinner-skinned varieties (think Grenache Blanc, or Vermentino, or Marsanne) are typically more like 165 gallons/ton. In this year where we saw unrelenting heat that began in late June (five consecutive months between 2% and 30% warmer than our long-term averages) we saw significantly less yield of juice from the berries. Vermentino (150 gallons/ton) and Grenache Blanc (142 gallons/ton) were close to our normal estimates, but still about 10% below what we expect from those grapes. Later-ripening varieties like Roussanne (131 gallons/ton), Marsanne (130 gallons/ton) and Picpoul (135 gallons/ton) were lower yet. And some of the trace varieties were so much lower that we were all sitting around the table scratching our heads as to why. Picardan saw yields of just 122 gallons/ton, while Bourboulenc was just 113 gallons/ton, and Clairette just 109 gallons/ton. We do get lower yields of juice from press loads that are less full, and those varieties do come in small lots. But we were also being careful in this lower-acid year not to squeeze the berries to the point that we were getting the lowest-acid bits from the heaviest press fractions, and it seems like this might have impacted the yields. We'll be doing some more investigating this upcoming harvest.
• But enough about yields. That's our problem to figure out. You're probably wondering what vintage in our history might be a good comp for the wines that we made. And you don't have to go too far back to see one that I found familiar. 2022 was the third year of a drought cycle and a year when that, combined with a fluke early May frost, pushed yields on whites to the lowest in our history. Then those low yields were exacerbated by a very hot second half of the growing season. Like 2024, it produced low yields with very high quality lots. We ended up using every drop of Roussanne that the vineyard produced in the Esprit Blanc, and it was still just 33% Roussanne. This year wasn't quite that extreme, but if you like the 2022 Esprit Blanc, I think you'll love the 2024. Going a little further back, I think this year will also resemble the 2015 stylistically, though with a little more body. 
• Now we just need a name for the new high-end white, and I'm not too proud to solicit suggestions. Let me know if you think of a good one!

Now that the blending decisions have been made, we can move forward in getting the wines racked, blended, and given time to settle and integrate. The Patelin Blanc and Lignée de Tablas will be the first to go into bottle, in early May. The Viognier, Marsanne, Grenache Blanc, and Cotes Blanc will be next, in June. And the Roussanne, Esprit Blanc, and our new high-end white will go into foudre and have another 9 months to evolve before their scheduled December bottling.

We're excited to share these 2024 whites with you, and apologize that many of them will go very fast because of their scarcity. But what there is should be memorable.

Harvest 2024 Recap: Warm Temperatures Push the Pace and Give Us an End-of-Vintage Surprise

Yesterday, with a few surprise bins of Tannat (more on that later) we completed the 2024 harvest. This was two weeks later than the first time we finished harvest, but still two weeks earlier than last year. And that's a theme for 2024: it's a lot like 2022... except when it throws a 2023-like curveball at us. But no matter when it happens, being done is a cause for celebration. 

There will be lots to remember from 2024, from us getting exciting and much-more-substantial picks off of our head-trained, dry-farmed Jewel Ridge plantings to the chance to break in new concrete fermenters in the cellar to our largest-ever (though still small) harvest of the 14th and final Beaucastel Chateauneuf-du-Pape grape to make it to us, Muscardin:

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's start out back in the spring, where 2024 started out reminding us of 2023. At the end of May, it was just a touch warmer than 2023, and well behind what we saw in 2022. Then, after a more-or-less average June, we saw a much warmer weather pattern set in. July shattered records as the warmest month by far ever seen in California. Paso Robles was no exception. We saw 14 days over 100°F and an average high temperature of 98.5°F. And not only were the hot days hot, we never got much of a break, as just four days failed to reach the 90s. August was nearly as hot (average high temperature: 94.5°F) though we did get a little break the third week of the month. Even September (average high: 90.6°F) was as hot as many of our midsummer months have been in the past, while October began with a seven-day heat wave that saw average highs of 105°F. If that sounds unrelenting, it was. The period between July 1st and October 11th (when we finished harvest for the first time) saw average high temperatures 4.3°F higher than our long-term averages, and average low temperatures 3.4°F higher than our long-term averages. In this chart below you can see the cumulative degree day measurements for our last 10 vintages at Tablas Creek. 2024 is the dashed orange line. You can see at the end of June we were still below our long-term average. The 2024 line crosses the average in July and then accumulates heat steadily until October, when it makes another turn upward to become one of our hottest years on record (though still behind 2022):

Another way of looking at the year is going month by month compared to normal. We started the year with two months that were cooler than average and since then have had five consecutive months between 2% and 30% warmer than our averages. And remember, these are already warm months:

As you might suspect, the pace of harvest was driven by our hot weeks in early September and early October. In their aftermath, fruit came tumbling in. But because even in the interludes it was still at least warm, we see something close to a bell curve in the distribution of harvest by week. In the chart below, blue is purchased fruit for the Patelin or Lignée programs, and orange estate-grown fruit:

You may have noticed the outlier in late October, which I hinted at in my opening paragraph. That surprise consisted of four more tons of Mourvedre, Grenache, Counoise and Tannat from an unusually plentiful set of "second crop" clusters. ⁠A second crop sets in maybe a month after initial flowering in the spring. Evolutionarily, these additional berries offer vines a chance to reproduce if the primary crop gets eaten or otherwise destroyed. But for a grapegrower, it's usually not worth going back and picking these clusters, which have less sugar and are typically smaller in size. But this year was different for us because in this relatively early harvest we had plenty of good ripening weather at the end. So clusters that in a later year, or one with an earlier onset of wet weather, wouldn't have gotten ripe, got the extra hang-time they needed to get into our sweet spot.⁠
⁠
We had extra incentive to go pick this fruit because it became clear during harvest that despite our wet 2023-24 winter we were seeing lower-than-normal yields. So we decided to let the second crop hang (instead of dropping it) in case we got lucky with late-harvest-season weather. And we did!⁠ Finally, second crop clusters are generally more prevalent in blocks with higher vigor. For us, that comes from head-trained, wide-spaced blocks with extra long cane growth. Tannat produces a decent quantity of second-crop clusters every year. This year, we noticed that the young, vigorous Mourvedre, Grenache, and Counoise vines on Jewel Ridge also had enough second crop clusters to be worth revisiting. We're happy we did!⁠ The lots that we got off Jewel Ridge seem like they're sure to be some of the highlights of the year.

⁠Even with that end-of-harvest windfall, yields were down 12.7% overall off the estate vs. 2023, which is a bit disappointing given that we had our second consecutive rainy winter and dodged frosts. We also have 15 additional acres in production, which means that our yields per acre declined to 2.35 tons/acre. There are really only two other years that produced yields around 2.5 tons per acre, and they both turned out to be terrific: 2021 and 2011. So that bodes well. Diving in detail, about half of the decline from 2023 were in two grapes (Bourboulenc and Grenache Noir) that we felt that we left a bit too much crop on last year, and on which we cut back intentionally. The other half came from smaller declines from a range of grapes:

Grape	2024 Yields (tons)	2023 Yields (tons)	% Change vs. 2023
Viognier	7.9	10.1	-21.8%
Marsanne	7.9	9.0	-12.2%
Grenache Blanc	24.7	29.3	-15.7%
Picpoul Blanc	6.3	7.2	-12.6%
Vermentino	14.4	13.0	+10.8%
Bourboulenc	4.5	7.2	-37.5%
Roussanne	23.7	26.2	-9.5%
Other whites	4.4	3.2	+37.5%
Total Whites	93.8	105.2	-10.8%
Grenache	76.5	97.1	-21.2%
Syrah	47.6	41.7	+14.1%
Mourvedre	37.8	47.4	-20.3%
Tannat	14.4	15.3	-5.9%
Counoise	14.8	22.4	-33.9%
Cinsaut	3.6	3.6	+0%
Other reds	8.1	7.1	+14.1%
Total Reds	202.8	234.6	-13.6%
Total	296.6	339.8	-12.7%

2.35 tons/acre is low for us in a non-frost vintage, about 20% below our 20-year average of 3.08 tons/acre. Some of that is attributable to the higher percentage of wide-spaced, dry-farmed vineyard acres that we have in production now compared to our first couple of decades, but it's also clear to me that yields did suffer in the heat this summer. Most concerning to me are three late-ripening, low-vigor grapes: Mourvedre, Counoise, and Roussanne, that were down an aggregate 20.5% vs. 2023 despite significant new acreage coming on line from Jewel Ridge. Neil, Jordy, and I have already started talking through what we're planning to do to help rejuvenate our older blocks.

We had 131 harvest lots, an increase of two vs. 2023. These included six fewer estate lots (88 instead of 94), three more Lignée lots (7 instead of 4) and five more Patelin lots (36 vs. 31). Despite the higher number of lots, the total quantity of fruit (535.5 tons) was actually about 18% less than last year. This was mostly driven by some of our standby Patelin vineyards, particularly the ones that we rely on for whites, coming in lower in yields than we expected. In response, we reached deeper into our network than we have in years, and have a lot of little Patelin lots. Our label designers will have to get creative next year to fit all the Patelin vineyards on the back label! In the photo below of our harvest chalkboard, estate lots are in white, while purchased lots are yellow. Each line represents one pick. And yes, we finished the year using every single line on the chalkboard, a testament to Chelsea's divination skills:

The duration of harvest was 59 days, just above our 20-year average of eight weeks. But that's deceptive. If you look at the initial conclusion to harvest on October 11th rather than the day that we finished harvesting our second-crop clusters, it was only 46 days, or six and a half weeks. That would have joined 2019 and 2020 as our shortest harvest seasons of the last two decades, and is probably a better way of thinking of the pace of this year.

One other way that you can get a quick assessment of a vintage is to look at average sugars and acids. Since 2010, our average degrees Brix and pH at harvest:

Year	Avg. Sugars	Avg. pH
2010	22.68	3.51
2011	22.39	3.50
2012	22.83	3.65
2013	22.90	3.63
2014	23.18	3.59
2015	22.60	3.59
2016	22.04	3.71
2017	22.87	3.74
2018	22.80	3.62
2019	22.30	3.62
2020	22.14	3.62
2021	22.12	3.55
2022	22.14	3.70
2023	22.77	3.51
2024	22.25	3.69

Unlike the outlier that was 2023, you don't have to go very far back to see a year with numbers like 2024. 2022 offers very similar numbers, as do years like 2020 and 2016, all hot years where the heat sustained itself through harvest. That suggests that it was the hot second half of the year rather than the cool first half of the year that was more important to the vines' output.

Of course, just because we've finished picking doesn't mean that we're done with our cellar work. There are still plenty of lots to be pressed off, tanks to be dug out, and fermentations to monitor. But it feels different than it does earlier in harvest, when you're emptying tanks to make room for the next pick. We've already put a couple of our open-top fermenters outside, along with our sorting table and destemmer. And now, when we press something off and clean a tank out -- like this concrete fermenter, one of two that we bought and used this harvest for the first time -- that's the last time of the season: 

In character, it's early to tell what things will be like, but I asked Director of Winemaking Neil Collins to sum up the vintage, and he was optimistic: "good maturity, great acidity, whites are showing great floral character and good depth, unfortunately it's a bit short, but it will be an interesting vintage, interesting in a good way. Textural with good intensity on the reds. I think it will be strong, a lot of good color and good intensity for sure. I think it will be a fun one." We're all looking forward to getting to know the wines of 2024 even better in coming weeks.

With the harvest in, we've turned to getting the vineyard prepped for winter. We've been spreading compost and seeding cover crop in our dry-farmed blocks:

At the same time, we've been getting our flock of sheep back into our no-till blocks, where they can eat second-crop clusters and start the process of spreading the nutrients and microbial activity in their manure. Lambs should be on the way in the next few weeks:

It's always an adjustment coming down from the intensity and pace of harvest. But this autumn season offers its own rewards. We'll settle back into the rhythms of the vineyard and help it make the most of the rain when it comes. It's ready for a rest, as are we. But we'll be able to rest better knowing that the 2024 vintage is in the cellar, and as far as we can tell so far, looking good.

Harvest Interns 2024: Loaded with Enthusiasm and Ready for a Successful Career in Wine

By Ian Consoli

Every year, we sit down with our harvest interns to learn about their wine journey and what brought them into the cellar at Tablas Creek. This year's batch of interns each brought a level of enthusiasm to the cellar that made each of their presences known from day one. Whether introducing themselves to our team in the office, enjoying a taste of wine with our tasting room team, or asking for pointers on how to use the espresso machine, the 2024 harvest interns, Austin, Elena, and Rachel, made it known that they are thrilled to be here.

With that first impression in tow, I sat down with each of them to find out their past, their journey into wine, and their ambitions going forward. The singular theme that stood out was their level of intention towards their journey into making a career in wine. They may have come from different backgrounds, but each of them caught the wine bug, and they have every motivation to make it their life's work. They are fantastic. I can't wait for you to meet them:

2024 Harvest Interns: (from left) Austin, Rachel, Elena

Who are you?

My name's Elena. I'm an intern here at Tablas Creek, working Harvest for 2024.

I'm Rachel. I'm one of the amazing interns at Tablas Creek!

I'm Austin Gambler. I live in Cayucos, California and I'm a harvest intern at Tablas Creek.

What's your story?

Elena: I grew up in Long Beach, California, and I moved up to this area seven years ago to go to college at Cal Poly. The Central Coast has been my home ever since. My undergraduate degree was in finance and business administration. I worked as an investment advisor for a couple of years before going back to school for environmental science and diving into the wine industry.

Rachel: I'm from Newport Beach, California. I went to Cal Poly and have been away for a while, and now I'm back on the Central Coast and loving it. I studied animal science and fell into wine while traveling around the world. I lived in Prague for a year, and then I taught English. I lived in New Zealand for three years and worked in wine there.

Austin: I grew up in Birmingham, AL and moved to San Luis Obispo County in 2015 to attend Cal Poly. I was really inspired by the California coast and the culture out here and wanted a change. I studied biochemistry, and after I finished, I got into wine.

So how'd you get into wine?

Elena: It started as a hobby, just going wine tasting with friends and my boyfriend. I always felt an affinity towards the people pouring for us in the tasting room and a little bit of jealousy. I wondered, "why do you get this super fun job?" So, while in grad school, I decided to take a part-time job pouring in a tasting room; the rest was history. I just really fell in love with being able to teach people about wine and tell stories about wine, and then my curiosity just kept going and going. The next step was to work a harvest. So here we are.

Rachel: My first job was when I was in college at Cal Poly and I worked at a tasting room in Paso when I was 21. I didn't know anything about wine, but I just loved it. I liked talking to people, and then I started traveling. I knew I wasn't going to be a vet, so I was like, what am I going to do now? When I went to New Zealand, I worked at a winery and was like, oh, this is awesome. Cause I get to use my science brain that I loved from studying a lot of chemistry and working with animals. And then it's also such a social thing and I love traveling so you can travel around the whole world with wine.

Austin: I grew up in a half-Italian, half-Jewish family, so wine has always been around for me. My family on my mom's side is from Sicily, and I feel like that comes with a really strong wine culture. Then, moving to this area and getting into the farm-to-table movement, I was able to bike downtown to the grocery store and see, oh, this wine's made in my backyard. That's pretty cool. I want to get into that. I felt like I had a pretty strong draw to microbiology in school, and it's one of the biggest parts of wine, so that's where the initial interest started.

Have you worked a harvest before?

Elena: Nope. This is my first harvest.

Rachel: This is my fourth harvest. The first one was in Marlborough, New Zealand. The second was in Germany, and the third was in Central Otago in New Zealand, so two in New Zealand.

Austin: I've done a couple harvests now. For some, I made my own wine in my garage or helped farm some vineyards for some friends. But this is my first official cellar harvest, processing a lot of fruit, and seeing how everything moves.

How did you end up working at Tables Creek?

Elena: I worked at another Regenerative Organic vineyard down in Santa Barbara County and poured for Charlie from the tasting room at Tablas. He noticed my passion for regenerative agriculture and recommended I follow Tablas Creek on social media. That was my first time learning about Tablas Creek. Shortly after, I saw an email that Jason was coming to do a tasting down in Goleta. I had a class that night, but I rushed out and caught Jason right as he was leaving the wine bar. I introduced myself and inquired about a harvest internship. He gave me Chelsea's contact information. We had a Zoom call that week and really hit it off.

Rachel: I visited California with my mom and friend, and I came for a tasting. I love biodynamics and the whole regenerative ag sort of thing. So, I did a tasting and then met the winery crew. This was last harvest. And I realized I would love to work in California. So I talked to Chelsea and then did an interview, and then here we are a year later.

Austin: Yeah, I feel like, shortly after starting in the industry here, Tablas was pretty high on my list. I did a tasting here, probably six months into getting into the wine industry in 2021. I had never done a wine tasting or anything like that. I was super keen to learn, and I had the most educational experience by far at Tablas as far as the history of the area, wine history, varietal history and blending. I was pretty inspired by that. That really resonated with me.

How's it going so far?

Elena: It's going great. It has really opened my eyes. I mean, I knew it was a lot of work to make wine, but I mean, it is so much work to make wine. It's really awesome to see how much everybody cares about making a quality product, from starting in the vineyard to the grapes coming into the cellar. Everyone is super intentional every step of the way, cleaning everything thoroughly, setting everything up properly and then processing all the fruit we started getting.

Rachel: Amazing. So good. The team is awesome. And yeah, it's good. Lots of different beautiful-looking fruit so far, so it's exciting.

Austin: I'm absolutely loving it. I didn't even have a cup of coffee this morning, and I'm absolutely frothing. Every time we have fruit around, I'm just excited and hyped up, and it gives me a lot of energy. So I'm in my happy place.

What's the best bottle of wine you've ever had?

Elena: I think what makes a good bottle of wine is good company and good food. Before I moved up here and was still living in Santa Barbara in grad school, one of my friend's partners had worked several harvests. They invited us over to bring a couple of bottles of our own, and they would share some of theirs with us. Then, we would just have a wine night and enjoy the food they cooked. Jared had worked two harvests in New Zealand, so he shared a bottle of Clos Henry Sauvignon Blanc, a place where he had worked harvest. It was totally different than any wine I had had before. It was super aromatic and just delicious, and there was a great story to go along with it. He smuggled it in his suitcase; some bottles were lost, but this one made it. Hopefully, I can return the favor once we have some 2024 wines in bottle.

Rachel: I think that question can be answered in terms of the actual wine, but I see it as the experience. I was in the Dolomites in Northern Italy, and I was with my mom and my best friend, and we had hiked for 10 hours up the Alps, and we got to this little Rifugio, which is this little hut in the mountains, and we had this bottle of wine as we sat looking at the sunset. We had been hiking the whole day, and then you're in the top of the mountains, enjoying this bottle of Lagrein from a local producer and just looking over the Alps at all the things that we'd hiked, and it was awesome. And I also love bubbles.

Austin: I think it's kind of hilarious, but I think I'm going to say it's the first wine I ever made. I'm not saying it's the most delicious wine I've ever tasted, but it was rewarding after farming the vineyard with a good friend. We made a sparkling wine like a pet nat. I was really interested in that, especially as a chemist, getting all my numbers and calculations and trying to capture that native ferment at the right time so the bottle's not exploding. And so we have bubbles. That first bottle we opened was just perfect bubbles coming out, and I was so stoked. I think I cried because I was like, it worked!

And what's next for you?

Elena: I'm definitely committed to working in the wine industry. I really like sharing stories about wine, and I really like teaching people about wine and helping the wine business thrive. Maybe something where I can help connect people to that story and, through that, help them learn to enjoy buying and drinking wine. I like being a part of that whole cycle, so I'll be looking for a job in that realm after harvest.

Rachel: I'm thinking of going to Australia. I definitely want to be a winemaker. I know that for sure. And I still want to travel more, so I'm thinking maybe going to Australia next or South America. But as of now, I'm unsure. Stay tuned.

Austin: I would love to visit the Rhone after working here and see the origins of how we do things. I feel super lucky to work with old-world equipment, like beautiful wooden uprights and foudres. As far as winemaking goes, I am looking at doing a southern hemisphere harvest in Chile. I did one in New Zealand last year. But Chile, to me, is calling a little bit more than somewhere like Australia or maybe even South Africa because, from everything I've heard, it seems and feels like it has this old-world kind of grip on it.

Anything else you want to share with the Tablas Creek audience?

Elena: Just that the wine here is amazing and the people are even more, well, I won't say even more amazing, but the people are amazing, and it makes the wine even greater because there's just so much love going into every single part of the cycle in every bottle of wine.

Austin: Before I started here, I was invited to the Esprit vertical tasting from 2000 to 2023. Jason and Chelsea were leading the tasting, and Jason was like, "alright, who was here for the first Esprit release?" And there were multiple people in the room who raised their hands. I thought that was the coolest thing. There's something really special happening here. Tablas is a benchmark for California winemaking and viticulture. I think that's a really beautiful thing and something worth getting involved in at any point. Being a part of something bigger than all of us is making an impact. Being somebody who supports that says a lot. So keep drinking the wine. It's made really well - responsibly and sustainably. Enjoy.

Harvest 2024 ramps to full speed, then cools down. Our vines (and our people) appreciate the respite.

On Monday night, I was snuggling under a blanket reading in our living room when I realized that it smelled like snow. No, it was never actually going to snow. Snow happens only once every few years in Paso Robles, and never in September. But that didn't change the fact that after a two month stretch that has ranged from warm to hot, the air felt different. It was already down in the 40s just after 10pm, and the crisp, electric air and the north wind would have sent me, if it were April, to check on our frost protection. In the end, it didn't come all that close to freezing. At my house it bottomed out at 38.7F, and at the vineyard it was a couple of degrees warmer. But that night, and the chilly, breezy day that followed and topped out only at 67.4F, definitely felt like a harbinger of the changing seasons. You can see from the chart below how different the last week has been compared to the beginning of September: 

As for the Tablas Creek harvest, this cooldown is giving the team a chance to catch their breaths after a rapid escalation of harvest. The first couple of weeks started slow, as we brought in 44.8 tons across those two weeks. The next week was a doozy. We brought in over 115 tons including one lot each of Viognier, Marsanne, Roussanne, Clairette Blanche, Grenache Blanc, and Vermentino, four lots of Grenache Blanc, seven lots of Grenache, ten lots of Syrah, and two co-harvested lots. Nineteen of these lots came off the estate, nine will go into Patelin, Patelin Blanc or Patelin Rosé, and one will become our newest Lignée de Tablas wine: a white blend from the Fenaughty vineyard in the Sierra foothills. The harvest chalkboard is filling up:

A few scenes from around the cellar will help give you a sense of things. First, the bins sitting on our crushpad, in this case Mourvedre (left) and Grenache (right):

Next, the daily chart that keeps track of our cap management for all our fermenting reds (notice the division into "pump over", "pulse air", and "punch down") as well as what's being received and pressed that day:

I'm guessing you're likely less familiar with what "pulse air" is than you are with pump over or punch down. For us, it's an important part of our program, and a way to keep the fermenting reds mixed without extracting harsher tannins. You need to do this mixing daily, at least, because the carbon dioxide bubbles that form during fermentation lift the berries to the surface, forming a "cap" or cake of mostly-whole berries at the top of a deeper pool of fermenting juice. You want the juice in contact with the berries because that's how you get the flavor extraction. In addition, leaving the berries to dry out at the surface invites problems such as spoilage yeasts. So typically you either push the berries down into the juice manually (that's a punch-down) or you pump the juice out from the bottom of the tank and spray it on the cap (that's a pump-over). But both have the potential to extract more of the harsher tannins than you might want: punch-downs because you're physically crushing the skins with each punch, and pump-overs because the pump's machinery ends up grinding up seeds that may have fallen to the bottom of the tank. The pulse-air, on the other hand, uses an air compressor and a long wand to release bubbles of air in the fermenting liquid. As that bubble escapes to the surface, it splashes apart the cap. This typically results in a gentler extraction. You can see the pulse-air in action below on one of our 1500-gallon wooden upright tanks, wielded by harvest intern Rachel:

In the vineyard, things have progressed rapidly, and everywhere you turn there is a jewel-like cluster of grapes, hanging enticingly. I particularly like the white clusters at this stage, as they pick up their first hint of honeyed tones. These Bourboulenc clusters should come in sometime in the next week or two:

At the same time, there are still clusters that are a long way from being ready to harvest. And that's just fine; we don't expect to bring in the last fruit until the end of October. This Grenache cluster is still going through the final stages of veraison:

I've been enjoying trying to come up with new perspectives on the ever-changing vineyard. One of my favorites has been to get underneath the vines and use a wide-angle to try to get the hanging clusters, the canopy, and the horizon line. Below you can see the results with Grenache (left) and Bourboulenc (right):

This week's cool-down hasn't meant that we've stopped harvesting. If you look at the harvest chalkboard above you'll see that we brought in nine different lots already this week. But it does take the pressure off. We were able to take yesterday and get our presses a much-needed servicing. We used some down time on Tuesday to get our recently-arrive 600-gallon foudres stacked and settled in our white room. We didn't harvest either weekend day last weekend. And we've been able to get the cellar team home by 4pm the past few days. That may not seem like much, but a week like last week meant 60 work hours for much of the team. Having a mellower week to recharge everyone's batteries is most welcome. 

Similarly, the cooler weather gives the grapevines a chance to recuperate and gather energy for their next push. The weather looks like it will warm up next week, not to any noteworthy level, but back into the 90s. Then things will get back on track.

One thing I'm going to be keeping my eyes on is yields. We're starting to get signals, mostly from our Patelin growers, that certain varieties are coming in much lighter than people expected. This seems to be particularly true with whites, although given that whites are mostly ready before reds, it's possible we'll see that reds will end up lower too. On our own property, it seems like Syrah, Grenache, and Grenache Blanc have pretty healthy yields out there. Viognier and Vermentino definitely look light. Roussanne, Counoise, and Mourvedre seem average to a bit below. But given that we haven't finished picking anything off our estate yet, it's hard to have the full picture. But I think we can conclude that our hopes of a truly plentiful vintage aren't going to come to pass. Look for more details in our next harvest update.

Meanwhile, I'm going to leave you with one more photo, taken by Vineyard Manager Jordy Lonborg at 4am yesterday. That's the nearly-full moon behind some high clouds, with the stacks of empty picking bins in the foreground. I'm not sure I can remember a more atmospheric harvest photo. There are moments of beauty every day out here. At this time of year, most nights, too.

Roussanne's 2024 Comeback Tour

If you’re a fan of our Roussanne, we’re sure you’ve noticed it’s been in short supply. Last decade we were regularly making between 500 and 1000 cases of our varietal Roussanne while also using it as the lead grape in our Esprit de Tablas Blanc and a supporting player in the Cotes de Tablas Blanc. That was possible because between 2010 and 2020 we harvested an average of 41 tons of Roussanne.

Since 2021, the story has changed. We pulled out a block that was under-performing that summer, but thought we’d be OK because we’d grafted about an acre of Roussanne to established rootstocks on Jewel Ridge the year before. In addition, we planted additional acreage on Jewel Ridge and new acreage on Cote Maduena to replace it. Unfortunately, our timing was bad. The three-year drought that began in 2020 had reached critical levels by 2021, and spring frosts that hit us in 2022 pummeled our largest remaining block of Roussanne and set back the new vines we had planted. Roussanne production, which had declined to 28.1 tons in 2021, cratered to just 10.5 tons in 2022. We weren’t able to make a varietal Roussanne at all, and using every drop of the Roussanne we did harvest in our Esprit Blanc only resulted in an Esprit Blanc with 33% Roussanne, our lowest total ever.

Thankfully, the Roussanne that we harvested those years was exceptional, and the wines that we did make are some of our favorites. If you missed this week’s Instagram Live focusing on the release of the 2022 Esprit and 2022 Esprit Blanc, Neil, Chelsea, and I were all wowed by the intensity and purity of the Roussanne character in the Esprit Blanc.

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Roussanne production bounced back somewhat in 2023, but less than we’d hoped as the frost damage from the year before proved serious enough that it impacted crop levels the next year. We harvested just 26.2 tons of Roussanne, but on a positive note, that included the first Roussanne from our Jewel Ridge plantings from the 2020 grafts. Although it only came to 1.23 tons it was remarkable. In total, we were able to increase the Roussanne percentage in the 2023 Esprit Blanc and will be bottling a small (260 case) varietal Roussanne in December.

Fast-forward to 2024. One of the grapes we’re most excited about in the vineyard is Roussanne. It’s a low-vigor vine in general, and often by this point in September, the vines can look pretty ragged. This year, they’re looking full of life. This is particularly evident on Jewel Ridge, where the young head-trained, wide-spaced vines are so bushy that Neil described them today as an "octopus". You can see from the below photo what he means:

Below those enormous canopies, Roussanne clusters are sheltered from the direct sun:

We’ve already harvested our first pick off of Jewel Ridge and at 1.45 tons are already above last year’s total with roughly two-thirds of the block still to go. The fact that this Roussanne is coming in so much earlier than we're accustomed to it ripening here is a great indicator of the health of this block. That wine is currently sitting in barrel in our cellar:

It's not only the Jewel Ridge Roussanne that is looking better this year. Even our older blocks are looking vigorous, at least by Roussanne standards. The block that we call "New Hill", where I photographed this vine (left) and two of the clusters on it (right) was planted in 1999, so this is 25-year-old Roussanne, looking good:

And there’s more good news for Roussanne on the horizon:

Roussanne, while susceptible to drought, seems to respond well to rainy years. With the 80” of rain we received between the last two winters, and another year separated from the ferocious frost event of 2022, Roussanne seems recovered and ready to put maximum effort into its fruit this year.

The 7 acres of Roussanne we planted between Jewel Ridge and Cotes Maduena in 2021 will reach their 3^rd leaf this year, and while we’re not going to let them hang too much crop, we’ll get some, and will get more for sure in future years.

We planted another 5 acres last summer, so additional reinforcements are on their way.

Roussanne, our most important white variety, seems to be on its comeback tour.

Harvest 2024 begins under ideal conditions as moderate temperatures return

At around 5am today, we kicked off the 2024 harvest with six bins of Viognier from the top of our tallest hill. Conditions were perfect; it was in the low 50s, which meant that the fruit got into the cellar chilly. As we were finishing up, the sun started to rise over the eastern hills:

As we’d expected, this was neither a particularly early beginning harvest (like 2022, when we started on August 17th) nor was it a late start (like 2023, when we didn’t bring in estate fruit until September 14th). That’s not surprising given that the first half of the summer was quite cool, though not as cool as 2023, while for six weeks starting early July it’s been hot. Now it looks like we’ve settled into an ideal pattern. Check out the temperatures compared to average (and compared to the previous six weeks) since August 12th:

The first pick is always a milestone, with the cellar team joining the vineyard crew out in the field. The crew, many of whom have been here for decades, always get a kick out of this. David Maduena, our long-time Vineyard Manager (pictured below at the back of the bin trailer) is starting his 31st harvest here.

In the cellar, we’ve been spending the last few weeks washing everything and checking that all our equipment is working properly. It’s all so empty that it feels like we’re working in a new facility. It won’t feel like that for long.

The team has already done a bunch of sampling today, and we expect some reds in tomorrow. Nothing off the estate yet (and maybe not for a week or two) but we should get the Pinot Noir from our place in the Templeton Gap and some Syrah for Patelin de Tablas. We’re thinking that yields are likely to be similar to last year, maybe a little better in grapes like Roussanne and Syrah. We’ll know more, obviously, in a few weeks. 

One thing that is clear is that we're looking at a harvest that seems more like a marathon than a sprint. There isn't any major heat in the forecast, with a minor warm-up this week (highs likely topping out in the low-to-mid-90s) followed by a weak low pressure system likely cooling things down so that our highs will be in the mid-80s. All of the red grapes on the estate, with the exception of some of the hilltop blocks of Syrah, are still in the middle of veraison. In some blocks it’s barely started. These photos of Grenache (left) and Counoise (right) were taken late last week.

All this is normal, and good. Ripening conditions appear ideal. The vines look healthy. An extended harvest always allows us more time to sample and to make better use of our tanks. It’s always good to ease into harvest rather than have it start like an avalanche. We’ll have lots more to share with you soon. Stay tuned.

Veraison 2024 suggests an early-September kickoff to harvest... then a break… then a mid-September kickoff to harvest

By Ian Consoli

Veraison, if you're unfamiliar with the term, is a physiological stage of grape development where the berries stop accumulating mass and start accumulating sugar. More visibly, red grapes start their color change from green, while white grapes take on more of a yellow tint. Both red and white grapes start to soften. The onset of veraison comes roughly six weeks before the beginning of harvest, and gives us our best estimate for what sort of schedule we're likely looking at. And it's lovely. Witness this massive Grenache cluster, from the dry-farmed section of our Crosshairs block. At roughly 10" in diameter, it showcases the vigor we're seeing in our dry-farmed blocks specifically. It's a sight to behold:

The story of this year's veraison is its irregularity. We attribute this irregularity, in part, to an early budbreak for Syrah, Viognier, and some Grenache blocks that was followed by a cool down at the end of March and start of April, culminating in a frost event on April 6^th. That cold spell forced soil temperatures down and kept the other varieties in dormancy. Between that and the series of heatwaves pushing temperatures over 100˚F (the threshold at which vines shut down for the day), we're expecting a somewhat staggered start to #harvest2024. With that observation in mind, the weather is at an optimal temperature pattern right now, and things are moving fast. I thought I'd take a quick romp through all the different red Rhone varieties to give you a sense of where each stands. At the end, I've included a chart with how this year compares to other recent years and made some predictions about when we're likely to start picking.

We spotted our first color in the vineyard in Syrah on July 23rd. Now, a little more than two weeks later, every variety is showing at least the first stages of color change, and the early grapes are mostly red. I'll start with Syrah, as usual the first Rhone red to enter version and the fastest to change colors, and go roughly from most-veraison to least. The cluster here is a bit ahead of the average in the vineyard, and I'd estimate that we're probably around 80% through veraison in Syrah overall:

Next is probably Muscardin. It came in second last year and we were unsure whether it was unusual or not, since it is our newest arrival and we don't have many years of history. As we're getting to know it better, it does seem to go through veraison on the early side. It's not as dark red as Syrah (nor will it be at harvest) but overall it looks like it's about 60% of the way through:

Grenache is next in line, at roughly 40% veraison overall. It's always a particularly pretty grape to watch change color, with the berries turning jewel-like in the sun. Look for lots more Grenache pictures in the next month:

Next is Mourvedre. Mourvedre is an unusual grape in that it can start going through veraison on the early side, but is one of the last to be picked. This characteristic long-ripening period means it just takes longer than the others do in this stage. These clusters are fairly typical, and I'd estimate it is 30-40% through veraison overall:

Counoise is the next one up. It is relatively impossible to find clusters with color at the lower parts of the Counoise block, with clusters similar to the one below about mid-way up. The clusters at the top of the block have a bit more color, putting our estimate around 20% veraison overall. Note the characteristic large berries still have some growing to do:

Veraison in the last three Rhone varieties we grow are just getting started or nearly non-existent.

Cinsaut is surprising because it's not typically a late ripener, and the literature says it ripens pretty much in sync with Grenache. But the cluster below was one of just a few with any color at all. Maybe 5% veraison overall:

Terret Noir took some searching to find any color. This cluster, with a few pink-purple berries in a sea of green, is about as advanced as it gets. I'd estimate we're around 2-3% on Terret overall:

Vaccarese simply had no color at all. I searched through the entire block (which isn't difficult, given it's only eight rows) and couldn't find a single berry with color. Vaccarese tends to be one of the latest varieties to reach veraison every year.

Although it's less visually exciting than with reds, white grapes also go through veraison. The grapes turn from green to something a little yellower and soften and start to get sweet. They also become more translucent. The process happens over a continuum as it does in the reds. Viognier goes first, followed by Vermentino, Marsanne, and Grenache Blanc, with Picpoul and Roussanne bringing up the rear. You can see the slight translucency that the berries of Grenache Blanc (left) and Vermentino (right) are starting to pick up:

While the veraison posts you're likely seeing from your favorite wineries may make it seem like veraison is a moment, like Christmas, it's probably better understood as a continuum, like winter, and first veraison is like first frost, or first snowfall. It will likely be a week until all the Syrah clusters at Tablas are red, and 3-4 weeks until the last clusters of later grapes like Mourvedre and Counoise have finished coloring up.

While six weeks is a good basic guide for the duration between the onset of veraison and the beginning of harvest, it's not totally constant and will be influenced by the weather that we get in the interim, as well as by the amount of fruit the vines are carrying and the inherent tendencies of the different varieties. For example, a consistently cool summer and a plentiful crop in 2010 gave us a full seven weeks between veraison and our first harvest, while 2021's consistent heat and low yields gave us just a five-week interim. Each vintage since 2010 is compiled in the chart below, with each year linked to Jason's blog post about that year's version:

 

Year	First Veraison Noted	Estate Harvest Begins	# of Days
2010	July 30	September 16	49
2011	August 5	September 20	47
2012	July 25	September 5	42
2013	July 17	August 26	40
2014	July 9	August 23	45
2015	July 18	August 26	39
2016	July 13	August 18	36
2017	July 20	August 30	41
2018	July 29	September 10	43
2019	July 30	September 4	36
2020	July 21	August 25	35
2021	July 21	August 24	34
2022	July 12	August 17	36
2023	August 7	September 14	38
2024	July 24	?	?

Using the range of durations between first veraison and first harvest (34 to 49 days), we can try to predict when we might begin harvest in this irregular year. Those raw numbers suggest that we’ll start sometime between August 27^th and September 12^th, which seems safe enough but also a wide range. Vineyard Manager Jordan Lonborg sees us beginning harvest on the first week of September for grapes that bloomed before the cool down, like Viognier and Syrah. Then, we'll likely have two slow weeks before the real push of harvest begins. The weather between now and then will determine where in the range we'll fall, influenced as well by the crop levels, since lighter crops ripen faster than heavier ones.

Overall, we're seeing crop levels similar to last year, with exciting standouts in much-needed white varieties like Grenache Blanc, Picpoul, Marsanne, and Bourboulenc. It is interesting because, even with all the rain we received the last two winters, we see relatively small berries, but large cluster sizes make up for it. That may be due to the hot summer. We averaged highs of 98.5˚F in July and 99.3˚F so far in August. Heat is good until temperatures exceed 100˚F and the vines shut down for the day. Those periodic shutdowns can result in uneven ripening. As we push to the second half of August, we're in a perfect heat pattern in the mid-90's, and everything should proceed as scheduled if this pattern continues.

What's next for the vineyard? We'll watch the different grapes go through veraison. That progress is already happening fast, and the view in the vineyard is changing daily. We'll be posting regular photos of veraison's progress on our Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram pages. In a few weeks, we'll start sampling the early varieties, looking for the moment when the flavors are fully developed and the balance of sugars and acids is ideal. In the cellar, we've already started to get ready by finishing our blending of the 2023s and pulling out and checking on all the tanks and equipment we'll need once harvest begins. It's likely too that we'll see some grapes from Patelin or Lignée vineyards, and from the Haas Vineyard Pinot Noir, before anything comes off our estate. Those grapes should start coming in a couple of weeks.

So, now we wait and enjoy the show. We have an idea of how much time is on our timer, and we know Mother Nature has pushed “start”.

Sunburn and silver linings: Taking stock after 2024's first heat wave.

The cool start to the growing season feels like eons ago. For the last three weeks, since June 21st, we've been in a classic Paso Robles summer heat wave. It didn't start out all that dramatic; between June 21st and June 30th the average high temperatures were about 93°F. That was a lot warmer than the first two-thirds of the month (average high 86.5°F) but only about three degrees above average for the season. But since the calendar flipped to July, it's been scorching. The average high in July so far has been 104.4°F, with nine of the eleven days topping the century mark and a maximum high of 111.9°F on July 6th. That average is nearly 13 degrees warmer than normal in what is already one of our hottest seasons. The full picture to date:

Grapevines evolved in a hot, dry climate, and do pretty well up to about 100°F. But above that there start to be consequences. The biggest of these is sunburn. If it's really hot for an extended stretch, exposed grape clusters can suffer direct damage as cell membranes break down, compromising a berry's skin and allowing the liquid inside to evaporate away. The result is hard, brown, sour raisins, as in this Marsanne cluster:

The temperatures required to cause this sort of cellular damage in grapes is typically around 125°F. Even in a Paso Robles heat wave we don't ever see ambient temperatures this hot. But fruit that's exposed to the sun can see temperatures 20°F-25°F higher than the ambient air. So, when the temperatures top 100°F, we start to be at risk.

It might seem straightforward to avoid sunburn by leaving more canopy arching over the grape clusters. And we try to do that. But this desire is at odds with what we need to do to keep mildew pressures at bay. In June, we're typically working to remove any lateral shoots and tuck the canes in our trellised blocks up into the wires, all to open up the fruit zone to the free flow of light and air and the lower mildew pressures that come with good air circulation. So it's always a balance between addressing these two risks. For the same reason, we typically orient our vineyard rows in a north-south axis, perpendicular to the prevailing west-east winds. That also allows all the clusters to get some sun exposure, which is good for ripening. In a heat wave, though, this means that the clusters on the west side of a row, which are exposed to sun in the afternoon when it's hotter, are at more risk of sunburn than those on the east side of the rows. These next two photos are taken in the same Grenache block but on opposite sides of a row. First, the east side, which looks great:

Unfortunately, the west side of the row doesn't look as happy, with sunburned berries on the outside:

The impact of the sunburn is uneven across different varieties. Grapes with more vigor, longer canes, and more sprawling shape (think Vermentino, or Bourboulenc, or Syrah) are mostly fine. I'd estimate that we're seeing less than 5% sunburn damage in those varieties of grape. Grapes with less canopy, shorter canes, and less vigor (think Counoise or Mourvedre) show more damage, particularly in younger blocks with less well-developed cordons. In some younger blocks I saw as much as 50% loss from sunburn, though overall across those grape varieties I'd estimate it's more like 25%.  And then there are the grapes like Marsanne, Grenache, Roussanne, and others who sit somewhere in between in growth pattern and damage. Overall, across the vineyard I'd estimate something like a 15% loss.

Unfortunately, the tools that we have to deal with sunburn are limited. There are some vineyards that are experimenting with widespread misting to bring temperatures down in peak heat times, but the infrastructure is expensive and it uses a lot of water. Others put shadecloth out to protect the fruit zones, but that's cumbersome, needs to be replaced every couple of years, and creates a ton of plastic waste that goes straight into the landfill. If it were later in the year, we could turn on our irrigation, and we've done that in some of our most stress-prone blocks, but that's more to stave off any later loss of vigor than it is a way to address the temperature of grape clusters exposed to the sun.

In terms of future options, we've talked about redeveloping vineyards along an east-west axis instead of north-south, so that the fruit zone is always shaded by the canopy. We've also talked about moving our rows farther apart from the 8 feet they are currently, so we can leave the canopies to sprawl more without worrying that they'll start to interconnect and make it difficult to get in and see what's going on. But those changes will have to wait for new plantings. Meanwhile we'll have to make do with half-measures like perhaps only tucking the canes on the east side of a row and letting those on the west side sprawl and provide more shade.

There are three pieces of good news. The first is that we're starting from a position of health. Thanks to two consecutive years of good rain, the vineyard looks healthy, and the canopies are still green and lush. I drove around almost the entire vineyard today and the vines don't look ragged or otherwise stressed, and everything is still a vibrant green:

The second piece of good news is that sunburn at this time of year doesn't typically have a negative impact on fruit quality and can even be an asset. Quantity will be negatively affected, sure. But in terms of quality a bit of sunburn can act like a fruit-thinning pass, increasing the intensity of what remains. And finally, the third piece of good news is that we had some quantity to spare. I spoke to Viticulturist Jordan Lonborg yesterday and he was confident that even with the losses we were going to see a healthy crop above last year's levels. He was even thinking that this might save a fruit-thinning pass and the labor costs that would entail.

I'll leave you with one photo, so as not to have your lasting impression be that this was a disaster. Here's a Grenache block, photographed from below. This is the west side of the vine row, and you can see the clusters ripening, green and plump, while the intense green of the canopy duels with an even bluer sky:

This heat wave is forecast to break tomorrow, and next week to have temperatures average or below. We'll all be grateful. Next stop: veraison.

Why we're glad for the wet 2023-24 winter and glorying in the (so far) cool 2024 spring

This past weekend was Memorial Day, and we spent Saturday evening with friends on their patio. I wore jeans and a long-sleeve shirt and brought a quilted Tablas Creek pullover for after the sun went down. It turned out I needed it starting around 6pm, and the friends broke out their collection of blankets to keep us warm while we hung out and chatted as the light faded and the stars came out. It was lovely. But it was also weird. This is late May! Where was the heat?

We usually assume that Paso Robles Wine Festival, always the third weekend in May, is going to provide the first summer weather of the year. Our goal was always to get a prime table under a big spreading oak tree so we had shelter from the 90° heat. Not this year. The day was sunny but breezy and cool, and as the afternoon drew to a close and the wind started whipping, we were looking for patches of sun to warm our backs. I'm not complaining; I would always prefer conditions like this to it being sweltering for a wine festival. But take a close look at the fleece and denim among our pouring crew:

Those are just two anecdotal examples, but looking at the weather since the beginning of April bears out that it's been cooler than normal. The average high has been about 4°F cooler than normal, and the average nighttime low about 3°F cooler than normal. That may not seem like much. But six days haven't made it out of the 50s. Another 13 days haven't made it out of the 60s. And we have yet to hit 90°F even once. 

Looking at it a different way, the first two months of the 2024 growing season have seen high temperatures been slightly cooler than the same stretch last year, which was by far our coolest year in more than a decade. The net result is that we're just starting flowering at a time of year when in a more typical year (like 2021) we'd have been at its peak.

This slow progression is consistent with the winter that we saw. Now that we're likely past any more rain, we can compare the winter of 2023-24 with normal. First, total rainfall compared to previous years, where you'll notice that it was above average at more than 29 inches, but nothing close to the crazy rainfall we got last winter:

Looking by month, you'll see that we got pretty close to our average rainfall most months, with the exception of a somewhat dry beginning to the winter (which we're thankful for given the lateness of the 2023 harvest) and a February that produced roughly double normal rainfall:

The rain also came more gently than we often see in winters here, where most of the rain comes in a few big storms. We had 49 days with measurable rainfall, which means that we averaged only 0.59" of rain each rainy day. By contrast, in the winter of 2022-23, we had somewhat more rainy days (62) and those days averaged 0.8" of accumulation. They were also more concentrated in January and March, which were the months where we saw flooding.

While it's generally a solid rule that in California, there's no such thing as too much rain, we were just fine with this most recent winter. It takes about 15" of rain to saturate our calcareous soils and provide sufficient water for our dry-farmed vines to make it through the growing season. It takes another 10" of rain to refill our wells to capacity and start to refill the reservoirs. Anything beyond that flows off and becomes extra capacity. If the state is in a drought, extra water helps replenish critically low reservoir levels. But given that the ample rainfall last winter already did that, we didn't need another 40" year, and we were grateful not to have to deal with creeks jumping their banks or customers dealing with washouts or closures.

The moisture did help keep our soil temperatures low and delayed budbreak to a normal time. Since then, the cool weather has mostly meant that we're having to keep mowing since the grasses between the rows keep growing and with the new growth in the vines it's too late in the year for the sheep to help. That means we're living with a shaggier-than-normal vineyard profile:

In the mornings, we're seeing weather that wouldn't be surprising in a place like Santa Barbara or San Diego (where they have terms for this: "May grey" and "June gloom"). But in Paso Robles, what is normally a once- or twice-a-month phenomenon has been pretty regular. I took a few photos on my way into work last week in our Scruffy Hill block that will give you a sense. The atmosphere is lovely for photos, and it's relatively rare here:

A close-up of one of the vines, with others marching away down the hill in the fog, is one of my favorite recent vineyard photos:

Finally, in the afternoons we've been getting another pretty but usually rare phenomenon: a fog bank massing over the Santa Lucia Mountains to our west. That fog has burned off during the day, but you can see it looming there, ready to roll back in when the sun goes down:

We're not worried about any of this. The vineyard looks amazing and the lack of stress is a great thing for vine health. The wet winter and cool spring mean that you can reach into the soil anywhere and just an inch or two down you get to damp, dark earth. Plus, it always warms up in Paso Robles, and even in a cool year like 2023, we have a long enough growing season to get the grapes ripe. It looks like we might not have long to wait; the forecast for the next couple of weeks looks like we'll be getting into the 80s pretty regularly, with some low-90s possible Thursday and Friday. Meanwhile we'll enjoy the unusual scenery and glory in the lovely daytime weather. If you're visiting in the coming weeks, you're in for a treat.

Budbreak 2024: Right on Time

This winter has continued to follow a pattern something close to the platonic ideal of a Paso Robles winter. Some November rain to get the cover crop started. A cold December, to force the vines into dormancy. Regular and plentiful rain January through March, to keep soil temperatures down, but with sunny and warmer intervals, to encourage cover crop growth. And then a turn in April toward spring-like weather. And as we'd expect, as we passed the spring equinox we've started to see budbreak in our early-sprouting varieties. Below are Viognier (left) and Syrah (right):

The rainfall-by-month graph for the winter so far shows the classic nature of what we've seen:

Budbreak, as you probably guessed from the name, is the period when the grapevine buds swell and burst into leaf.  It is the first marker in the growing cycle, a point when we can compare the current season to past years.  Upcoming markers will include flowering, veraison, first harvest, and last harvest.  And like harvest, budbreak doesn't happen for every grape simultaneously. Early grapes like Viognier, Grenache Blanc, Grenache, Vermentino, Cinsaut, and Syrah tend to go first, followed by Marsanne, Tannat, and Picpoul, and finally, often three weeks or more after the earliest grapes sprouted, Roussanne, Counoise, and Mourvedre. We've seen budbreak in all the early varieties, but are still waiting even for the middle varieties like Marsanne, which I was surprised to find still fully dormant on a ramble around the vineyard yesterday:

This year is about average for us, significantly later than most of our drought years, though a couple of weeks earlier than 2023. The timing that we're seeing comes despite that we haven't recorded a below-freezing night here at our weather station since February 12th. That budbreak waited some six weeks after our last frost reinforces the importance of wet soils, which hold cool temperatures better than dry soils do. For an overview, here's when we saw budbreak the last dozen years:

2023: First week of April
2022 Mid-March
2021: Last week of March
2020: Last week of March
2019: Second half of March
2018: Second half of March
2017: Mid-March
2016: Very end of February
2015: Second week of March
2014: Mid-March
2013: First week of April
2012: Mid-April

In addition to the variation by variety, there's variation by elevation and vineyard block. Grenache is a good example. I took the following four photos as I walked up the hill. The first photo is from the bottom of the block, where cool air settles at night. You can see the buds swelling, but no leaves yet:

A little further up the hill, you see the first leaves emerging:

At roughly two-thirds of the way up the hill, you see some buds unfurling larger leaves:

And at the top of the hill, nearly all the buds are out:

It will be another few weeks before we see much sprouting in late-emerging grapes like. This is Roussanne (left) and Mourvedre (right), both looking more or less as they would have in mid-winter:

Now our worries turn to frost. Before budbreak, the vines are safely dormant, and a freeze doesn't harm them. But once they sprout, the new growth is susceptible to frost damage. April frosts cost us roughly 40% of our production in both 2009 and 2011 and a May frost cost us 20% of our production in 2022, with Mother's Day marking the unofficial end of frost season. So, we've still got more than a month to go before we can relax, and I'm thankful that it will be a few weeks before our later-sprouting varieties and our lower-lying (read: more frost-prone) areas are out enough to be at risk. 

That said, there's nothing particularly scary in our long-term forecast. We're supposed to get one more late-winter storm later this week, but it doesn't seem likely to drop below freezing. After that, we're expecting drier weather as the storm track shifts north. But there's a long way to go.

Meanwhile, we'll enjoy the rapid changes in the vineyard, and the hope that always comes with the emergence of new buds. Please join me in welcoming the 2024 vintage.