vintage reports

2006

For the first time in a few years, we did not begin the season wondering if the vines were going to survive.

The winter of 2005/2006 was good to us with no major cold spells and even though bud break was a bit later than usual, we soon caught up as the weather turned warm. We had our fair share of rain throughout the summer, but this rain, coupled with the heat made for a great growing season. The growth in the vineyard was more than we had seen in many years, producing much more work (shoot positioning, hedging, and crop thinning). By mid August we were very excited by what we were seeing in the vineyard. Grapes were maturing quickly, leading us to believe that harvest would arrive early. How wrong could we be??? Early September brought the tail end a hurricane, leaving us with 60 mm of precipitation. As September progressed, temperatures fell and it continued to rain into October. There were few times where we had more than 3 or 4 days without some rain.

Harvesting began on September 17 with Pinot Noir from our new plantings which will be called the Brickyard, more on this to follow. Thanksgiving weekend provided a warm sunny spell, allowing us time to harvest Chardonnay, Syrah and Merlot before it rained again. By October 12 the weather turned very cold and we saw snow flurries for a couple of days (not too far away, Buffalo was digging out from beneath 3 feet of heavy wet snow). We survived all of this and harvested the last of the Cabernet Sauvignon October 28.

Some early comments
It is now mid December and we have had time to make some early evaluations.

Pinot Noir We are more and more excited as time goes on. The Pinots have great colour and flavours. We'll have to wait and see but this could be a classic vintage for this variety. We are also excited about quantity. This is the largest crop of Pinot Noir we've ever had at Lailey Vineyard, and with the new vineyard on line, we will be making about 750 cases of 06.

Sauvignon Blanc Great flavours and the tell-tale acidity that makes Sauvignon so popular. We have 50% of the production ageing in older French Oak barrels and 50% in stainless steel tanks so as to maintain the fresh herbaceous character. Again, this is the largest crop of Sauvignon Blanc ever produced at Lailey Vineyard, and possibly the best vintage we've had for many years! We are looking forward to releasing this wine in late March.

Chardonnay This will be a refreshing vintage for Chardonnay with some really good flavours, balanced by a nice core of acidity which is what sets Niagara apart from the rest of the world. We have a cool climate which produces wines with great balance and wines that are well suited for drinking with food.

The Big Reds It is a little early to talk about the red varieties as they have only just gone into barrel, but they all have amazing colour and rich flavours. We are particularly excited with the Syrah and Cabernet Franc. We have two new varieties planted in the new vineyard, Malbec and Petit Verdot. These will be interesting varieties to watch in future years as the vines mature. This year they were harvested and fermented in small containers so that we could taste them through to evaluate the flavours but after pressing, we blended them with some Syrah. We have a couple of barrels of this blend and hope to release this as a single bottling. Stay tuned as it tastes great already!

Late Harvest Vidal and Riesling were harvested December 5-8 and are now fermenting in the winery. We were happy to have the opportunity to harvest last week as there looks to be a long warm spell ahead. We have no plans for Icewine this year, so I am happy to say we are all done!

2006 continued...

Following upon the vintage report for 2006 that I wrote some months ago, we have now had some time to evaluate the red wines that are in barrel. I think it is still fair to say that when the rains began in September, we were disappointed. It had been such a good growing season but then we found ourselves dodging the showers and storms.

Tasting through the reds in the past weeks, we are finding that the colour is deep in all of the Bordeaux reds and they are well balanced with good concentration of fruit flavours. They have a way to go yet, but they are showing lots of promise. Here are some early notes on the wines.

Cabernet Sauvignon Deep purple in colour with those classic flavours of cassis and plum. The wines are very well balanced with soft tannins and are already developing nice viscosity. We are thinking this vintage will enjoy as much praise as 2002.

Cabernet Franc Always the crowd pleaser at Lailey Vineyard. It is the one wine in which year after year we find those lovely aromas of purple flowers (violets and lilacs). This year is no exception. Rich flavours of raspberries and blackberries with just a hint of green spices. This is one of the standout wines in the cellar with great texture and length. I am looking forward to 2010 already (for drinking).

Merlot Finally a crop of Merlot!!! We have been waiting since 2002 for this. Merlot is not so hardy in this area and suffers when the temperature dips below -20 C. A soft ripe wine with sweet blue fruit flavours. It reminds me of all those times I ate fresh cooked black raspberry pie and custard when I was young. This is a wine that will be ready to drink much sooner than the Cabernet Franc and Sauvignon and it will be such a treat.

Syrah Until 2003 we had not made a Syrah at Lailey Vineyard. Thought to be difficult to produce ripe fruit, we had not planted any vines. Now with each passing year, we get more and more excited by the wines. Still tough to grow, we are now burying the vines each winter so the harsh temperatures don't kill the buds and we will be sure to get a crop. The fruit we harvested this year was more mature than any other and has produced some amazing wine with dark fruit flavours with classic pepper and spice notes and a great balancing acidity. For the first time, we have been ageing Syrah in Canadian Oak barrels which is very exciting. Some added notes of dark chocolate and smoky vanilla. This may be the perfect match for Canadian Oak.

2005

This year, strange weather patterns tested the vines and our patience.

The year began with a warm spell. January 13th was a record breaking day as it hit +18.C in St Catharines. It was down hill (and scale for that matter) from here. Temperatures dropped rapidly and the 2004 Vidal Icewine was harvested January 17th when the temperature fell to -15.C . During the following two weeks, the vines suffered severe bud damage when temperatures were recorded at -24.5 .C . The wind machines that were installed in the vineyard to replace the cold air surrounding the vines with warmer air from aloft, offered little recompense. When bud break finally occurred in the spring, the losses were greater than anticipated - 80 - 85 % of the buds had died. Some varieties produced no buds at all: Gewurztraminer, Sauvignon Blanc and Merlot.This meant no 2005 vintage for those varieties from our vineyard. Even Vidal, which is known for winter hardiness, had a 40% reduction in crop.

But that is enough doom and gloom. Although the spring started roughly three weeks later than normal, the heat did arrive. Indeed, a spurt of warm dry spring weather was followed closely by hot dry summer weather. By mid summer the grape vines had caught up and harvest was beginning to look promising. The summer heat and near drought conditions accelerated the ripening of most varieties. By the beginning of September, the early varieties were approaching maturity. Harvest began at Lailey Vineyard on Sept 11th with Pinot Noir, and Zweigelt. The crop was light but the quality superb. Harvest in general was condensed as varietals reached maturity rapidly and in the same two week period. Normally, harvest lasts for six weeks.

Icewine harvest was also early this year. A cold snap mid December enabled us to have the grapes pressed and fermenting in barrels before Christmas, which is always nice. This way we can relax with friends and family and enjoy turkey dinner, undaunted by the rise and fall of degrees centigrade. As we taste the new and evolving wines during the winter months, we are pleased with their intensity, complexity and balance. We look forward to revisiting these wines as they develop in oak and stainless steel in the months (and years) to come.

2004

Despite our late summer fears, instilled by cool and cloudy weather, September brought not only hope but ripeness delivered by heat and sun. Some early October rain lent some urgency to the Pinot Noir harvest, as the swelling berries of this variety's notoriously tight bunches threatened breakdown. Good vineyard management throughout the season, low yields as a standard practice (reduced further still due to the on-going recovery from the 2002/03 winter), and hand-harvesting were all important to being able to achieve complete ripeness this vintage.

The Chardonnay and Pinot Noir harvests are perhaps the most exciting. The aromas and flavours of the vintage are revealing themselves to be complex and precise as the malolactic conversion comes to an end. The biggest surprise is Cabernet Franc, which seemed to take forever to ripen. We had our doubts. However, not long after pressing and even before malolactic conversion, the Franc was already showing its beauty and richness, with none of the spindly herbs and vegetables one might assume from observing the weather.

All of this is not to say that the flavours of this vintage will be like the intensely hot and dry vintages of 1998 and 2002 for example. The wines of 2004 will be cool climate wines. However, there are ripe cool climate wines and under ripe cool climate wines, and these are definitely ripe, complex, and headed for some good life in the cellar.

The Riesling Icewine harvest of December 19th was a welcome bonus. An early Icewine harvest means fresher, brighter flavours that keep Icewine on the side of elegance and complexity and away from the heavy, at sometimes cloying results of late picking. Riesling is especially nice when picked early as it is full of lemon, lime and fresh pear aromas and flavours.

It is true that marginal vintages are a test of a producer's vineyard practices and winemaking talents. We look forward to proving ourselves in the glass when we begin to pour the results of 2004.

2003

After two very good vintages - 2001 and 2002 - the Niagara region suffered one of it's coldest winters since vinifera grapes have been grown in this area. The winter of 2002/2003 started with lots of excitement as we began the Icewine harvest on December 2nd, the earliest on record. What was to follow was unexpected.

There were many cold nights with temperatures as low as -24.C. What we discovered in the spring, is that these temperatures had inflicted a lot of damage on the vines. By harvest, the damage was confirmed. Harvests of most varieties were reduced by as much as 65% and some varieties not only failed to produce a crop, but the vines did not survive and would have to be replaced.

At Lailey Vineyard the micro climate normally keeps temperatures from falling too low. Only once before have we experienced severe cold that damaged the harvest. That was in the winter of 1992/1993 when only Merlot was severely damaged. In the winter of 2002/2003 Lailey Vineyard's crop was reduced in total by 75% with no harvest of Merlot, Pinot Noir, Zweigelt, Sauvignon Blanc, Gewurztraminer, and a reduced crop of Chardonnay. With all this damage we produced less than 1/2 of the volume of wine planned for that vintage. This was the unfortunate case at most wineries in the Niagara region.

On a related note, we feel that it is important to remind consumers of the importance of the Vintner's Quality Alliance (VQA). This is because many wineries affected by the severe crop shortage have decided to produce non-VQA wines that blend imported product with Ontario product, to compensate for the loss of production. While we understand that this decision may be appropriate for many wine producers, we think that the consumer who is interested in purchasing 100% Canadian wine should be aware of the fact that fewer 100% Ontario wines will be available from the 2003 vintage and to find them, one must look for the VQA symbol.

The VQA was brought into being 15 years ago to tell the consumer that the wines produced with this logo on the bottle would be made from grapes that grown in a designated viticultural area in Canada, have been tasted by a panel of experts, are varietally correct, and express no winemaking faults. To ensure that you continue to support the wines that are produced from 100% Canadian grown grapes please be sure that the bottle still has the VQA logo on the bottle

2002

This was the second great vintage in a row at Lailey Vineyard.

The summer was long and hot. The fall was long and warm. We were able to pick all varieties exactly when we wanted to do so. We harvested Pinot Noir on the 24th of September, which is about two weeks earlier than most vintages.

The fruit at harvest was clean and ripe by all measures. The wines from this vintage are, as a result, full of expressive fruit aromas and flavours and well balanced. We are very excited to present these wines in their youth and to continue to taste them as they develop through the years.

2001

The 2001 vintage was hot and dry with the lowest rainfall for many years. Harvest began on September 23rd and ended on October 30th. Light rain in October slowed the harvest a little but with no adverse effects on quality. The wines of 2001 show rich fruit and intense flavours with well-balanced acids in the white wines. Our vineyard was fortunate to escape the Asian Ladybird Beetle infestation this year which contributed to herbaceous odours and flavours in many Ontario wines from this vintage. The beetles did not arrive in our area until one warm day in November. By then, the harvest was over. We had tremendous success with the wines of this vintage including winning Best Cabernet Franc in Canada at the Canadian Wine Awards in 2003.

2000

Our first vintage as a winery.

This was a typical cool climate vintage in Ontario. The spring was a little late and the summer gave us some good heat, but not a lot of sunshine. October was a fabulous month, however, and a lot of precious ripening time was gained. We actually harvested Cabernet Franc on the November 1. So the lengthy and sun-filled fall saved the vintage.

Still, when we first released the wine from this vintage, particularly the reds, we lamented that they were not richer in fruit. We found the wines to be predominantly earthy, albeit intense.

When we drink the wines from this vintage today (winter 2004) we discover that many of them have gained a lot from bottle aging. We are particularly impressed with the evolution of Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Pinot Noir and Sauvignon Blanc.Thes wines have developed beautifully in mouthfeel and flavour. The fruit has appeared alongside the earthiness and now spice, resulting in some delightfully complex and intense wines.