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Château Rouquette

October 2006 : Harvest 2006 - Hot and Wet!

This was our 10th harvest and definitely the most difficult!

The weather differentiates one harvest from another. The main features of 2006 have been:

The continuation of the hot weather, which started in 1998-90: this saw an upward shift in post-War average temperatures of 1.5°C (see our December 2005 newsletter and graph below). This has benefited the quality of Bordeaux, although in the early '90s it was masked by exceptionally heavy rainfall, especially in 1992, 1993 and 1994. The last few years have seen low rainfall and have produced a run of generally excellent vintages. Hot temperatures and low rainfall is the winning combination. For 2006 as a whole, the temperature during the growing season averaged 19.5°C, the second hottest since the War, after the record in 2003 - see graph.

This hot summer contained some wide variations. July was a scorcher - the hottest since the War and, at an average 25.2°C, the hottest month ever, except for August 2003. In contrast, August was the coldest since 1986 whilst September has been the hottest post -War, at a pleasant 20.2°C. This hot weather has been good for sugar levels.  In mid summer, some people were talking of another miracle, like the 2005 vintage. This was drenched by a deluge in the second week of September, just before the harvest. As can be seen from the chart below, by historical standards the level of rain in September was high but not unusual.

The illusion of Noah's arc has been heightened because 2006 has followed 6 dry Septembers. The rain has also been unusually concentrated into just a few days. The big problem was that the combination of rain with high temperatures, caused rot to spread very fast. Rot is the problem no one has in Bordeaux - except one's neighbour! It forces one into harvesting before the grapes have reached full maturity. It also highlights the difference between well maintained vineyards with low yields and those with densely packed, high yielding vines. The green harvest we made in August paid off in a lack of rot as well as in greater concentration.

 We harvested our first Merlot on 20 September, a couple of days after the rain. The rain reduced alcohol levels slightly but they averaged a reasonable 12 ½ -13 degrees. This was our earliest harvest, after 2003. Like that year, the heat has matured the grapes quickly. Acidity is higher than we like but this will reduce with the malolactic fermentation. We are pleased with the Merlots and the plot we reserve for Rouquette (our first label) has some excellent potential, but has not yet finished fermenting. However, fermentations this year are happening very fast but without excessive heat (no need to set my alarm clock to 3 o'clock in the morning to check the temperature of the vats!)

 As is often the case, the problem was picking our Cabernet Sauvignon at full maturity. We delayed picking and spent a nervous weekend waiting for rain, which fortunately did not materialise, as a front just missed us. As usual, the weather forecasts have been unreliable. There is one 10 day forecast on the internet that always seems to predict rain for each of the next 10 days, throughout the harvest - it has done so for the last few years. We have learnt to ignore it, and most other forecasts as well. 

We finished picking on 2 October. We would have liked to wait a bit longer but more rain was on the way. We have a couple of vats of Cabernet at 12 ½ degrees of alcohol that we will probably use for Rouquette. There is much more variation between our different vats this year than there was last year, when everything was excellent. The fact that we only put 15-20% of our total harvest into Rouquette allows us to maintain quality even in difficult years.

On 30 October a mini typhoon hit the Gironde, with gusts up to 140 kph. We lost electricity for 4 hours but some people lost it for 3-4 days. The implication of no temperature control and no pumps in the middle of the fermentations is a frightening scenario, and some people are rumoured to have had their wine ruined.

It looks like being a better year for the Merlot based St Emilions than the Cabernet Medocs. Every harvest has its' moments of depression and mine was when I checked our rain gauge after the deluge, a few days before harvesting, and it was almost overflowing with rain - the first time in 10 years that had happened. However, the final wine looks far more promising than I ever dreamt at that moment!

Michael Banton       10th October 2006