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Harvest in Napa Valley is the earliest since late 1980s

Published:  10 October, 2013

While the harvest throughout much of Europe started abnormally late due to the extended winter and cold spring, the Napa Valley in California has experienced its earliest start to a vintage since the late 1980s.

While the harvest throughout much of Europe started abnormally late due to the extended winter and cold spring, the Napa Valley in California has experienced its earliest start to a vintage since the late 1980s.

Some winemakers, like Jon Priest of Etude, the cool climate boutique winery in Carneros, even finished picking by the end of September, while Beringer , which produces in excess of 8 million cases per annum, expects to complete harvesting much quicker than normal, by the end of October.

Laurie Hook, Beringer's chief winemaker who focuses on the company's premium labels, is very excited by the quality of fruit from its single vineyards. "This could be an outstanding vintage," she told Harpers. "The Chardonnay is looking excellent, and the Merlot from our Bancroft Ranch vineyard  in the Howell Mountain AVA has wonderful concentration and intensity of flavour."

Beringer's viticulturalist in the Napa, the English-born Will Drayton, hailed the 'incredibly long growing season' in the valley this year. "Last winter was exceptionally dry, which brought forward both budburst and bloom  by quite some time," he said. "We started picking on August 8, the earliest for 26 years, but we've not had excessive heat which has led to this ideally long period of ripening." He revealed the yet-to-be-picked cabernet franc in the Steinhauer Ranch vineyard is so good that Beringer will make a single varietal production of it for the first time in six years.

Likewise, the quality of fruit in Sonoma has elicited optimism from leading  producer,Chateau St Jean's winemaker, Margo van Staaveren. "We're delighted with what we've had this year," she said. "Today, we picked two tons of Petit Verdot off our Moon Mountain vineyard, and it looks fantastic, as does our Cabernet Franc there." The aptly-named Moon Mountain area received AVA status only on October 1, making it the fifteenth in Sonoma. With vines planted up to 1,900 feet, it is difficult to reach, and has 'purple dirt from its volcanic soils' according to van Staaveren.  

* You can folllow Geoffrey Dean on Twitter on @geoffreydean01

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