Aglianico Harvest
The Aglianico grapes are off the vines and at the winery. Everyone is breathing a big sigh of relief! It is great to be finished with our Aglianico harvest.
Final Harvest of the Year
Friday we did our final machine harvest of the year, the Aglianico - our latest ripening variety. The day began with the bins being delivered at 2 am. John and the boys met the trucker at the vineyard to unload them. The actual harvest began between 5:30 and 6 am. It is amazing how different the vineyard looks and feels in the light of the stars. It would have been romantic if there were not so much work to be done!
Snippets of Harvest
I won't bore you with the technicalities again - you can read "Our First Machine Harvest" for a few more details. I would like to show some pictures though, so you can see the difference between harvesting in the dark and in the daylight.
Our oldest son drove the harvester again and this is the beautiful view from the top.
Hopefully you can see the grapes dropping from the arm into the chase trailer.
I would love to share with you the sweet flavor of the Aglianico grapes. The brix on these reached 25 meaning they are at 25% sugar - that means, they are wonderfully sweet!
Once the harvest was complete, the bins were loaded into the truck which has returned from another vineyard's harvest.
There were some precarious moments with the loading, a couple of "almost" mishaps, but thankfully, no bins were lost and no serious injuries sustained.
As you can see, John is very serious minded while moving and loading the bins. Each bin can hold up to 1400lbs so there is a lot of danger.
There was also much speculation as to the total ton-age we were shipping off. We ended up with 14.5 tons which is very good for third leaf vines.
Aglianico Harvest Complete for 2010
As I watched the truck pull away, I was reminded of a children's book I have read so many times, "Follow That Truck". The book follows different trucks, from log to milk trucks, on their journey from picking up the raw product to delivering the sell-able goods. I wanted to follow that truck! Instead, we celebrated by making (and eating) doughnuts!