2011 Harvest Update!

October 3, 2011

As I’ve written many times before, we farmers are truly at the whims of Mother Nature, which is an amazing and challenging reality. Last year we experienced the latest harvest ever at Castoro and this year is right on par with last year. Cooler than normal summers being a huge factor in this shift.

This year we are experiencing another challenge on top of the late ripening of the fruit. Back in April many parts of the Paso Robles appellation were hit with a brutal frost, which left a lot of damage throughout certain vineyards. Until now the extent of the damage was relatively unknown, but we will be the first to tell you now that it is not good! On average, our yields this year have been significantly down from years past and as Niels put it “big crops tend to get bigger and small crops tend to get smaller!” For example, we usually get 3-4 tons per acre on our Chardonnay, this year we got less than a ton per acre and there is really nothing we can do about that! Another favorite, our Blind Faith Pinot Noir comes from two separate blocks and one of them literally has little to no fruit this year (yikes)!

As of now we are about 20% of the way through harvest and even with the grim figures we remain positive and optimistic out at the winery. Resilience is very important in Ag Business and we have been doing this for a very long time. Even though the yields have been extremely low, the quality has been very high on everything that has come in and we are excited about what it has to offer. As I mentioned, one block of our Blind Faith Pinot Noir is looking very sparse but luckily the other block is yielding some good fruit, which will allow us to keep this wonderful wine in production (however small it may be)! If all goes to plan our Blind Faith Syrah will be coming in tomorrow and the BF Zinfandel is looking very strong as well.

With rain in the forecast this week we have more challenges ahead, but rest assured our Dam Fine Crew will make the most of this harvest, however small the yields may be. With that said, expect 2011 to be a harvest of great quality and low quantity!

Cheers,

Luke