Many years ago on this blog I said I’d try to not use French words in the blog or when talking about wine. Veraison though is a word that only exists in French. The English translation is: When the grapes turn from green to red. So, everyone uses the word veraison through out the world because it’s easier than saying; “when the grapes turn from green to red”, every time.
It’s a big event for us in the vineyards. It means the grapes are going to start adding color and flavor. It also means it’s almost time for us to stop spraying. The tasks change from maintenance to harvest preparations. We’ll now start topping the vines, that means cutting the long tops off, to get ready for netting. When netting goes on the vineyard work is really done. We usually start that in August but we’ll be a little early this year it looks like.
We had our first veraison last Friday. Millie sent me a picture of it starting in our Pinot Noir vineyard at Noon. When I got home that night the Mourvedre in the home vineyard was also changing color. The picture is from our front yard. We still have a few weeks before all the vineyards change but we seem to be early this year. Last year we had green grapes into September in some spots.