Bumping Off the Bumper Crop
Most farmers and horticulturists dream of having a bumper crop. For us, however, it is more of a nightmare. What is a bumper crop and why don’t we want it? The ancient term comes from a toasting glass filled to the brim. You had to clink or bump it without the cup running over. Big crops and quality wine are such uneasy bedfellows that they seldom sleep together. Part of the problem is getting the grapes fully ripe. However, even if you manage to tick the right boxes in terms of the concentration of sugars, acids, etc, the wines tend to be wishy-washy, lacking real concentration, flavour and zest. It seems as if the vines can only produce certain amounts of these less measurable things and a big crop just dilutes them. We spend a lot of effort trying to get small sized crops of small berries, which are what our winemakers dream about. Why small berries? Because the juice itself lacks flavour and most of it is in the skin. The bigger the grape, the bigger the ratio of juice to skin flavour.
