Early report and favorite photographs of the start of the 2024 Lodi harvest

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Old vine Carignan harvest in Lodi' s Mokelumne River AVA, September 2, 2024.

For most of Lodi's smaller, handcraft wineries, the 2024 wine grape harvest began in mid-August. The pace of the picking of old vine blocks, which are generally lower yielding than younger trellised vineyards, picked up during the last week of August and first week of September.

A big question for much of the industry has been how much of an impact 2024's extraordinary heat waves, which began in June, will have on grape quality and yield. One initial impression shared by Markus Wine Co. owner/grower/winemaker Markus Niggli⏤who began picking his Nicolini Ranch Carignan (oldest vines planted in the 1930s) on September 2, and Rous Vineyard (Zinfandel planted in 1909) on September 5⏤was the following: The heat waves have had negligible impact... 

Sep 9, 2024 at 8:00 AM Permalink

Two Gen Z professionals pick Lodi wines younger wine followers would love to love

Two Gen Z Lodi wine professionals, Anna Delgado (left) and Elvira "Elvi" Fonz-Gutiérrez.

Co-written with Anna Delgado and Elvira Fonz-Gutiérrez

Just a few years ago the wine industry talk was all about Millennials (people born between 1981 and 1996). What do Millennials want? What are Millennials thinking? Especially, what are Millennials buying?

Nowadays, or so it seems, it's more about Generation Z (born 1997-2012), the latest generation to reach adult beverage drinking age. However, never in my nearly 50 years in wine-related businesses have I ever seen a generation more castigated. The general feeling in the wine industry is that early to mid-twenty-somethings just aren't interested in wine. They'd rather drink craft beer, pop cannabis products, or gulp down flavored water, of all things.

Is fine wine that uninteresting to today's youngest adults? Yes and no. Two months ago we addressed this topic in a post entitled Do not talk about what young consumers think about wine unless you're under 30. The upshot: If you want to know what Gen Z consumers think or want, you should ask them. Don't make errant assumptions. They speak well enough for themselves, thank you...

Sep 5, 2024 at 9:00 AM Permalink

Thou shalt covet thy neighbor's grapes (handcraft brands flock to Lodi for distinctive fruit)

West Sacramento's Craig Haarmeyer of Haarmeyer Wine Cellars celebrating his Lodi Chenin blanc harvest.

In recent years, the roll call of winemakers  based outside the Lodi appellation who are producing wines from Lodi grown grapes has been getting bigger and bigger. 

This, if anything, is a far cry from just twenty or thirty years ago when many vintners openly ridiculed the very idea of making wines from Lodi grapes. Many winemakers, magnanimously, used to dismiss the region without comment⏤they simply didn't buy grapes from Lodi. 

One example of both a journalist and vintner who couldn't resist making comments can still be found in the 2007 book called New Classic Winemakers of California, in which Steve Heimoff asked Mark Aubert, the acclaimed Napa Valley consulting winemaker, if he could be "happy making wine in Lodi." Aubert laughs (according to Heimoff), saying...

Sep 3, 2024 at 8:00 AM Permalink

Our favorite historic passages extolling the glories of wine

Anaya Vineyards' Gerardo Espinosa—recently recognized as one of Wine Enthusiast's 2024 Future 40 Tastemakers—harvesting his family grown Petite Sirah.

Over the past four or five years the wine industry in California has been dealing with the serious issue of overplanting of grapes⏤a crisis that has been challenging wine industries in virtually every wine producing country in the world over the past twenty years (see our previous post, While wine consumption in the U.S. slumps, American appreciation of wine grows unabated).. 

This has led to quite a bit of hand-wringing, particularly in mainstream press. The oversupply of grapes, combined with recent statistics demonstrating a leveling off of consumer consumption in the U.S., is being described in a number of ways⏤a "grape apocalypse," a "dangerous crossroads," an "unprecedented" or "existential crisis," and so forth⏤leading to the conclusion: The American wine industry is in danger of shutting down...

Aug 28, 2024 at 7:00 AM Permalink

Why the Certified Green seal on wine bottles is more important than ever

A sign seen all over the Lodi appellation, and increasingly in other wine regions outside the Lodi appellation: The Certified Green seal for vineyards certified by LODI RULES (a.k.a., CALIFORNIA RULES) for Sustainable Winegrowing.

Why is a wine bottle bearing the Certified Green seal⏤indicative of wines farmed according to LODI RULES (or its equivalent outside the Lodi appellation, CALIFORNIA RULES) for Sustainable Winegrowing⏤more important than ever?

I can think of two words: Generation Z...

Aug 21, 2024 at 7:00 AM Permalink

Liberating Americans from the yoke of conventional wine preferences

Summer wine lovers in Lodi's Guantonios Wood Fired, a farm-to-table restaurant known for its selection of alternative (i.e., unconventional) style wines.

Early history of American wine appreciation

Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Usually, of course, when we cite this well known quote, it is in reference to more sinister subjects. 

When it comes to wine, though, it also seems like we are constantly repeating the past, and only punishing ourselves for it. 

Take, for instance, our nasty habit of simplifying what makes wine interesting. As Americans, we've been doing that since the 1800s, ever since the country's earliest wine entrepreneurs, particularly in California, began planting every grape they could get their hands on, in every possible corner of the state. They did that, of course, because they had no idea what grapes grow best in the New World, nor exactly where to put them...

Aug 19, 2024 at 7:00 AM Permalink

A California cork tree harvest, and why natural cork is the only choice for sustainable, regenerative and socially equitable closures

Just-harvested cork tree on UC Davis campus. Cork Supply USA.

It may be time to rethink your choice of bottle closures. This was the overriding message, this past May 2024, when for the first time in the entire United States, there was a harvesting of cork trees⏤on UC Davis campus. 

The cork tree harvest was actually a demonstration conducted by Cork Supply USA for the benefit of students in the school's renowned Viticulture and Enology department, first established in 1880... 

Aug 13, 2024 at 7:00 AM Permalink

All about the Christmassy colors of summer grapes

Mokelumne River-Lodi appellation Zinfandel during in mid-July, just beginning veraison.

The objective of Vitis vinifera, or grapevines, from their very beginning⏤speculated as dating back over a million years ago, based upon evidence of fossilized leaves and seeds⏤has always been the same as that of humankind: To bear fruit and multiply.

In the Northern Hemisphere, this basic objective becomes visible during the months of July and August. It is called veraison, or véraison in the original French, for when the colors of black skinned grapes turn from green to red, violet, blue and blackish colors... 

Aug 8, 2024 at 7:00 AM Permalink

Anaya Vineyards' Nebbiolo and varietal innovations bring new definition to Lodi's Clements Hills appellation

Nebbiolo picker in Anaya Vineyards' Potrero Vineyard, Clements Hills-Lodi AVA.

It is time to catch up with Anaya Vineyards, one of Lodi wine country's most interesting stories; especially since the latest release of their estate grown Nebbiolo⏤a grape native to Northern Italy's Piemonte region⏤which only adds to Lodi's growing reputation for bold, alternative, contemporary style, terroir focused wines.

If you've been a Lodi wine lover for more than a decade, you might recall that the original label for wines crafted by Anaya Vineyards owner/winemaker Gerardo Espinosa was Viñedos Aurora, established in 2009 and named after the Anaya family's first vineyard (planted in 1998) in the Clements Hills-Lodi Viticultural Area.

Accordingly, Viñedos Aurora established its reputation on the basis of deep, dark and tannin-laden vintages of Petite Sirah and Cabernet Sauvignon very much representative of the shallow, gravelly clay hillside slopes unique to Clements Hills. It is a terroir, in fact, so different from the deep, ultrafine, fluffy sandy loam and flat-as-a-pancake landscape typifying the original farmlands planted around the City of Lodi, that it served as the original impetus for the proposal to divide the Lodi appellation into seven different sub-appellations, back in 2005...

Aug 6, 2024 at 7:00 AM Permalink

How LODI RULES for Sustainable Winegrowing is directly addressing climate change

Mechanical harvester in Vino Farms' showcase sustainable vineyard, Grand Vin Lands.

Our recent consecutive days of over 100° F. temperatures are just one of the many signs that our climate is changing as we speak. So is the uptick in forest fires, tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, droughts, and many other weather events posing a direct threat to populations, industries and economies.

So far the distance between Lodi and heavily forested areas have kept the impact of concerns such as smoke taint in grapes and wines grown in the appellation to a minimum, but the threat remains real, the danger imminent. 

Glaciers are melting and seas are rising. By how much? Science-based estimates are putting the rise in sea level at nearly 1 foot within the next 30 years, about 2 feet by the end of this century. Bear in mind that that the elevation of Downtown Lodi is just 35 feet. San Francisco is already barely 4 feet above water, and grape growers on the western edge of Lodi are farming in leveed areas below sea level. We won't be around when water below the Lodi Arch reaches people's ankles, but no doubt this will be a serious concern for our descendants...

Jul 30, 2024 at 8:00 AM Permalink