Winemakers talk up “fantastic” fruit quality in early vintage

The wine grape harvest is looking like one for the ages, with hot weather driving yields down but quality up, in one of the shortest vintages on record.

d'Arenberg chief winemaker Chester Osborne in the McLaren Vale vineyards.

Australia’s wine grape harvest is looking like one for the ages, with consistently hot weather driving yields down but quality up, in one of the shortest vintages the industry has ever seen.

Winemakers in many regions are talking up the “fantastic” fruit quality, which Taylors Wines managing director and Clare Valley Wine and Grape Association chairman Mitchell Taylor said has winemakers excited about an excellent year for both red and white varietals.

The lower yields being brought in this year won’t do much to punch a hole in the nation’s wine glut however, with Australian Grape and Wine chief executive Lee McLean saying a strategy still needs to be developed to help growers who want to exit the industry do so in an orderly way.

d’Arenberg chief winemaker Chester Osborn told News Corp Australia late last week he was in the final few days of vintage in McLaren Vale, having only started in late January.

“It was obviously a warmer season, a drier season than we’ve had for ever it seems,’’ Mr Osborn said.

“But the warmth - there weren’t too many peaks, no real hot nights, and the vines in McLaren Vale have held up pretty well.”

Mr Osborn said it was the earliest vintage in d’Arenberg history by three days, starting on January 24, “and it will be a much earlier finish by a lot more days than that’’.

“Everything came in much faster,’’ he said.

“The yields have been not too bad in McLaren Vale, they’re variable, some are pretty low and some are OK.’’

Taylors Wines managing director Mitchell Taylor. Picture: Supplied

Mr Osborn said the quality of almost everything was “outstanding’’.

“The whites all look really good, the reds are absolutely outstanding. I haven’t seen a year like this for a fair while.

“There have been beautiful wines for the last four years but this year it’s back to really big, solid, fragrant reds.

“When they’ve got this fitness about them, the concentration of gutsy fruit, the shiraz for example, the yeasts struggle a little bit which is really good because it sits there at a warmer temperature just moving along slowly which makes it even better.

“It’s a very exciting year actually.’’

Mr Osborn said every month of this year’s harvest had been hotter than normal, bringing forward all of the processes such as bud burst and harvest itself.

Mr Taylor said Taylors was about 70 per cent of the way through its crush, and while some growers in the Clare Valley had been hit with frost during the season, overall things were looking great.

“Yields are down on average, but can I say the intensity of the flavours and the colours are absolutely outstanding...we’re only into the first week of ferment with a lot of our reds but they’re already that deep red, inky, crimson colour that really excites the winemaking team.

“The whites, we’ve already harvested all of those. We’re getting some really good aromatic characteristics on those.’’

Randall Wine Group managing director Steven Trigg said it had been a challenging vintage because of the extended hot and dry periods, and “without a lot of relief at all that does make it challenging when you are operating at scale’’.

Randall Wine Group’s Steven Trigg and Warren Randall at the National Wine Centre. Picture: Tom Huntley

“But it does mean that by and large the quality is exceptional.’’

The Randall group is the largest private vineyard owner in Australia, producing for both the bulk market and its own brands.

Mr Trigg said the extended bout of dry weather indicated the importance of water supply to the industry going forward.

Australian Grape and Wine chief executive Lee McLean said the thematic of an early and short harvest was broadly consistent across Australia’s wine growing regions.

“Generally the story for most regions is it’s been an early vintage and a relatively compressed vintage,’’ he said.

“So that’s made for some pretty hectic periods for growers and wine trying to get the fruit off.’’

Mr McLean said Western Australia and Tasmania conversely had fairly normal harvests.

“Quality has been pretty good, whites in particular have been looking pretty good in some South Australian regions,’’ he said.

Mr McLean said more broadly, the industry was still struggling with oversupply.

“Given our oversupply situation, a lot of growers will have made decisions about whether they actually pick for the return they’re going to get.

“That’s a pretty big story we’re grappling with at the moment.

“For winemakers they can only buy fruit that they can make into wine to sell, so there’s that lingering oversupply impact.’’

Mr McLean said the industry was interested in working with the federal government - whoever that might be in the near future - about strategies to help reduce the oversupply.

A recent Senate inquiry recommended that a mandatory code of conduct be put in place for winegrape purchasing, in order to redress the perceived imbalance in power between growers and purchasers, while recognising that there were numerous difficulties with the implementation of such a plan.

These included the difficulties inherent in putting in place quality standards which might vary from region to region and also the perishable nature of the product.

Mr McLean, whose organisation represents both growers and winemakers, said strategies to help some growers exit the industry in a considered fashion would be welcomed.

“There is a role for government in trying to build demand at home and overseas, and also we know there’s a lot of growers out there, they are getting older, they’ve lost money year on year for quite a long time now, and they’re either looking at getting out of the industry or transitioning into another crop, but they don’t have the money to do it in a sustainable way.

“We don’t want people walking away from their vineyards and causing all sorts of biosecurity problems or doing the wrong things with those vineyard posts which are quite toxic if they’re not disposed of in the right way.

“There’s a role for government there to remove some of the barriers to exit for those who want to do it.

“I think there’s a rationale there for a level of intervention in a targeted way.’’

Mr McLean said Australian Grape and Wine was “open-minded to a mandatory code of conduct provided it’s really well tested with growers and winemakers to make sure that it’s not causing any unintended problems down the line.’’.

The Senate report, published in February, said the huge oversupply in the wine sector, caused by massive over-investment between 1980 and 2008, is “not a problem that Australia can market its way out of’’.

Wayne Quilliam, director of indigenous wine brand Mt Yengo Wines, which sources grapes largely across the Adelaide Hills region, said the region appeared to be almost fully recovered from the bushfire damage it sustained in late 2019.

“It’s been a long way back for this region and it’s very promising to see this year shaping up to be one of their best,’’ he said.

“The last few years have been hard for the growers and winemakers with vines at just 30 per cent capacity but this year it is closer to 70 per cent which is fantastic to see,” said

Mt Yengo in recent weeks shipped its first container of wine to the US and also supplies Carnival Cruises.

Originally published as Winemakers talk up “fantastic” fruit quality in early vintage