I was talking to a fellow grower the other day and he was quite sure that the harvest on the lower half of planet earth was somewhat of a disaster. Would love to get some info on this. Thanks.
That’s quite a broad sweep, going from Australia to New Zealand to South Africa to Chile-Argentina-Uruguay-Brazil…does your friend care to be more specific?
Pyramid Valley in NZ talked about the fruit being “mint” in one of their Instagram posts and possibly the best ever vintage for them.
Maybe you heard about a different country/ continent?
The lower half of the planet. Wow. There are years when the Cote d’Or and Beaujolais have radically different vintage characteristics. Different parts of Piedmont can be quite different in the same year. The hemisphere generalization is…surprising.
This is almost certainly not true in NZ.
New Zealand had a long hot dry summer and so many areas have reported great quality fruit. NZ summers are not actually that hot, so nothing in the way of sur maturite issues. Temps over 30 deg C (85 deg F) are really hot for us
Yes there were issues with bush fires in parts of Australia. However much of the South east of the country had magnificent autumnal riopening and harvest conditions.
Locally in the Limestone Coast (coonawarra, Padthaway, Mt benson, Mt Gambier etc) yields were down but quality was very high, with no smoke taint.
Must have been shitty weather in Maipo Valley, Australia and Mendoza, New Zealand.
Yes, it should be noted that Margaret River is 2,000 miles or so from the Yarra Valley for example.
That sounds lovely. I’m retiring there when global warming heats up Southern California beyond my comfort zone!
For South Eastern Australia, a general summary would be quality good to very good, but yields are down. For some that is a little down, for others it is a lot down.
A few regions were impacted by the bushfires, either directly or indirectly through smoke taint, but poor fruit set has been the main difficulty for most areas.
I’m not sure it is possible for Australia to have a bad vintage everywhere.