December 31, 2009
Blog Catch-up
Got quite behind on a lot of tasks during harvest, and am now trying to get caught up. Posted two new photo galleries from a couple projects at the end of the summer. Enjoy!
Posted by Stephen at 1:17 PM
December 13, 2009
2010 Calendar Released!
Just finished editing the last photo for the new 2010 Notaviva Vineyards wall calendar. You can purchase a copy here!
Posted by Stephen at 5:06 PM
November 7, 2009
New Tasting Room Milestone
Wow. What a crazy day! We set our new tasting room record with 260 tastings in a single day. Many thanks to Beth, Shayna, Mary Beth, and our newest recruit Lucinda who all hung in there through a very challenging afternoon.
In addition, we also had a wedding proposal at the tasting bar right in the middle of the madness. It's so great to be part of people's lives, and wish them the best!
Posted by Stephen at 12:05 PM
October 8, 2009
Seventeenth (and last) Spray of the Season
Just to be safe I wanted to put on a little Oxidate into the Cabernet Franc as we've been having some rain here and there. The fruit is looking great, and it would be a tragedy to have any mildew show up now with only a few days before harvest. Looking like next Wednesday!
Oxidate - 1/2 gallon per 50 gallons
Posted by Stephen at 9:46 PM
September 14, 2009
Holiday Party Booking Discounts
We've announced a "discount competition" for booking holiday parties here in the tasting room as follows:
The first booking gets the venue rental for $100!
The second booking gets the venue rental for $200!
The third booking gets the venue rental for $300!
And so on up until we reach our normal booking rate, which depends on day of the week, time of day and other factors.
Discounts do not include wine, live entertainment or catering. Party must be booked prior to December 31, 2009. Other restrictions apply, call us at 540-668-6756 for more details!
Posted by Stephen at 9:55 PM
September 11, 2009
Sixteenth Spray
This morning I hit the Viognier with some botrytis protection:
Elevate - 1 pound per acre
Prophyte - 2 pints per acre
Posted by Stephen at 9:52 PM
September 8, 2009
Fifteenth Spray
Today I hit the Cabernet Franc, Petit Verdot and the new plantings with:
Microthiol Disperss - 4 pounds per acre
Captan - 2 pounds per acre
Posted by Stephen at 9:50 PM
September 4, 2009
Ramp Construction
While we were in construction mode we decided to go ahead and finish the west deck handicap ramp. Not required by code, but definitely the right thing to do. Enjoyed quite a bit of assistance from my "assistants" !
Enjoy the pics.
Posted by Stephen at 1:13 PM
September 2, 2009
Virginia Wine Gazette
Shannon and I were on the cover of last quarter's Virginia Wine Gazette. Our story is in this issue, but that hasn't been released online yet, but you can check out the previous cover!
Posted by Stephen at 8:32 PM
August 31, 2009
Fourteenth Spray
Put down some Elevate on the Viognier to fend off some botrytis that was starting to show on a damaged cluster here and there. Basically we had a bit of sun scald and some bee damage which opens the berry skin and the botrytis gets inside. But no longer!
Elevate - 1 lb per acre
Posted by Stephen at 8:30 PM
Winery Upgrade Construction
So our current winery setup was NOT going to be able to handle the 2009 crush and production plan. Our temporary case storage we built last year got us through 2008 but now we're out of room again. So to maximize the height of our building (16' ceiling) I opted to build a mezzanine under which we would be able to double our barrel storage capacity.
The key to whole project would be insulating the entire building, not just a portion of it. Thus construction progress through two very miserably hot weeks in late August. Of course many of you will remember people saying "2009 really hasn't been a very hot summer..." UNTIL I go to pick up a hammer. Then the temps were sure to shoot right back up. Very nice.
Posted by Stephen at 9:35 AM
August 30, 2009
Viognier Brix Check
Checked out the Viognier this morning. Starting to see a little Botrytis due to all the rain we had last week, but the Pristine is holding everything else off really well. Might do a botrytis-specific spray before applying the last Pristine spray (for the Viognier) of the season.
Brix = 18.4
pH = 3.14
Looking like harvest will fall somewhere around September 17th or so. Now begins the sleepless nights, agonizing over spray pre-harvest intervals, sugar development, acid retention, weather patterns, equipment allocation, lug allocation, crew shortages but most of all FLAVOR DEVELOPMENT in the fruit. It's gotta be right!!!
Posted by Stephen at 11:46 AM
August 22, 2009
End Of Summer Case Discounts
Just announced, now through the end of August we're offering 20% off of any case purchase, including mixed cases And if you are ordering online, we'll also extend a 10% discount on shipping and handling!
Posted by Stephen at 9:34 AM
TalkLoudoun.com Article
Wanted to introduce you all to a member of our team, Ed Reeve, who grows our Chambourcin and our 2009 addition Cabernet Sauvignon. Ed was featured in a recent TalkLoudoun article and we were asked to drop by to take some pics. TalkLoudoun CEO and Publisher Miriam Nasuti was on hand to direct the shoot. Ed is doing an awesome job with his vineyard, and we had a great time walking the rows, tasting the fruit and letting the kids run around.
If you want to pick up a few bottles of our Ed-grown "Celtico" Chambourcin, visit the online store!
Posted by Stephen at 9:21 AM
August 20, 2009
Thirteenth Spray
Pristine 10.5 oz per acre
I prefer holding off on the expensive strobulurins (like Pristine) until the very end of the season. That way I can rely on the sulfur-based compounds until about a month out from harvest, then stop using them to ensure there are no sulfur residues on the fruit going into the winemaking process. Prevailing theory is that any additional sulfur can cause excess off-aromas and undesirable compound formation during the fermentation. So now that we're just under a month out from harvest I can plan two Pristine sprays and we're picking nice clean fruit.
Also, because I knew we were supposed to be getting lots of rain the next two days it was critical to get a spray down, so I ended up having to spray at night. Creepy stuff - check out this pic taken from the cab of the tractor (sorry so blurry, will turn off the engine next time...)
Checked the brix on the Viognier yesterday, we're at 15.6 so looking like harvest somewhere in the Sept 10-15th range. Fruit is looking great!!!
Posted by Stephen at 9:12 PM
August 5, 2009
Guest Pouring at the Wine Kitchen
REALLY looking forward to my first Leesburg-area guest pouring tonight at the Wine Kitchen. Shannon and I have dined at this fine establishment a number of times (oh such full tummies...) and are thrilled to be pouring our wines there tonight.
I'll be there from 5-7 PM and our tasting room manager Danielle Martin will be joining me to talk about all the great times we're having in the tasting room every week. If you're in the Leesburg area this evening come on by for a glass!
http://www.thewinekitchen.com/goings-on.html
Posted by Stephen at 8:40 AM
August 4, 2009
Twelfth Spray
Captan - 2 lb per acre
Microthiol Disperss - 4 lb per acre
Carbaryl 4L - 2 qt per acre
Saw a few grape berry moths and some damaged fruit here and there, so added the Carbaryl and no more problem!
Posted by Stephen at 9:10 AM
August 3, 2009
Vineyard Update
Today Seve and the guys began pulling off the grow tubes from our April planting. Vines look pretty good, although most of them had some obvious downy mildew damage down inside the tubes where the spray couldn't reach. Kind of expected that with all the rain we had early on. Still, I'd say 95% of the new plantings have already reached cordon wire height so we're in pretty good shape!
Quentin finished up the Viognier hedging on Friday then took off for vacation for a week. When he gets back it will be time to start over on the Petit Verdot. Vines grow. Good times.
Posted by Stephen at 10:55 PM
July 23, 2009
Eleventh Spray
Captan - 2 lb per acre
Microthiol Disperss - 4 lb per acre
Posted by Stephen at 10:54 PM
Notaviva Cheerleaders Let Us Hear You!
It's that time of year again, the Virginia wine events online popularity contest! If you've been out to Notaviva and had a good time, then give us a shout out by voting here:
http://www.virginiawineevents.com/poll/2009winerypoll.php
You can vote once a day, so keep coming back!
Posted by Stephen at 5:28 PM
July 14, 2009
Preliminary Wine & Music Pairing Results Posted
I've been working hard at analyzing the results from our one-year anniversary celebration event a few weeks ago, our wine and music pairing event. Still have a lot of data mining I'll be conducting, and reading through the open ended comments is fantastic (I'll publish them in a week or so after the event participants have had their exclusive first peek) Also, I'll be putting together some "music metrics" i.e. tempo, key etc. to layer in those elements of the pairing data.
What I have done so far is put together some charts illustrating which music track the event participants chose as their favorite. To refresh your memory, each wine was poured blind, then we played the ten music tracks (30-second clip each) and everyone rated how well the music enhanced (or detracted from) the wine. Then each track was played again at a 15-second interval and everyone had to pick only one music track that was their favorite with that wine. This information is what I have created the charts from.
Enjoy!
Wine 1 - 2008 "Ottantotto" Viognier
Wine 2 - 2008 "Vincero" Viognier
Wine 3 - 2008 "Calor" Chardonnay
Wine 4 - 2007 "Cantabile" Cabernet Franc
Wine 5 - 2008 "Celtico" Chambourcin
And for those of you who weren't aware of the event we hosted, here is the details!
To celebrate our one-year anniversary, we are pleased to announce the world's first wine & music pairing event
The Notaviva Experience
Saturday - June 27, 2009
7 pm - 10 pm
Admission $25 per person - Reservations Required
For the first time, a select group of wine and music enthusiasts can participate in a live experiment based on experiential sensory pairings. The event has been designed to ensure an unbiased forum for the consideration of the complex ways in which auditory stimuli can influence the perception of wines. The event shall proceed as follows:
- Five wines will be individually presented (4 oz blind tasting)
- Each wine will be accompanied by ten 1-minute clips of music from widely varying genres with a 10-second silent pause between clips
- Tasters will have evaluation materials available to rate each clip according to the current wine being tasted
- Evaluation materials will be collected at the end of the evening and loaded into a research database for graphical presentation on the Web
7:00 pm - Winemaker welcome, experiment overview and tasting tips
7:20 pm - Wine 1 presented
7:40 pm - Wine 2 presented
8:00 pm - Wine 3 presented
8:20 pm - Wine 4 presented
8:40 pm - Wine 5 presented
9:00 pm - Winemaker wrap-up, open discussion and group social
Hors d'oeuvres, gourmet cheeses, fresh breads and desserts will be served.
Don't miss this unique opportunity to be a part of wine history!
Posted by Stephen at 10:04 PM
July 12, 2009
Tenth Spray
Captan - 2 lb per acre
Microthiol Disperss - 4 lb per acre
Assail 2 oz per acre
Posted by Stephen at 10:52 PM
