Grampians Estate winery at Willaura, in Victoria’s Western District, goes grape guns for sheep graziers

TOM and Sarah Guthrie began growing grapes as they believed there was more to life than sheep.

Rich pickings: Tom Guthrie shows grapes for one of the 15 wine varieties produced at the

TOM and Sarah Guthrie began growing grapes and making wine because they believed there had to be more to life than sheep.

“Tom couldn’t see life revolving around sheep, so we put in some vines” Sarah said.

While they still run 9500 ewes and prime lambs, they now have two vineyards and produce up to 15 wines at their winery at Willaura, in Victoria’s Western District.

The couple’s 3.23ha vineyard, planted in 1989, is just south of the Great Dividing Range and next to the Grampians National Park.

The couple also have a 4.85ha vineyard at Great Western that has some 130-year-old shiraz vines.

The couple bought the Great Western vineyard in 2009 and established a cellar door.

“We put the cellar door at Great Western because it’s on the main road and get’s a lot of drive-by traffic,” Sarah said.

At the Willaura vineyard there are 1.8ha of shiraz vines and 1.4ha of chardonnay, as well as the winemaking facilities.

At Garden Gully in Best Western there are 2.4ha of shiraz and 2.4ha of riesling vines.

Willaura has granite sand over sandstone soil and receives an annual rainfall of 700mm and Garden Gully has river loam soil and averages 550mm of rain annually.

The vines produce about 0.8 tonnes to the hectare.

Grampians Estate makes 12 to 15 sparkling, white, red and fortified wines. Pollyanna’s Pinot — is named after the Guthrie’s 17-year-old daughter.

The wines produced from these vineyards have gained five red Halliday stars and won 30 trophies since 2002, including best shiraz at the 2002 Victorian Wine Show, best shiraz at the 2005 National Wine Show and Winestate Magazine’s best sparkling in 2010.

Grampians Estate has established a reputation for its cool-climate peppery shiraz, but Tom and Sarah also grow chardonnay and riesling.

“We planted varieties based on what grows well in the district and what there was a market for,” Tom said.

“The grapes get all the heat they need to ripen south of the diving range and that’s what the consumer loves.

“This area puts more pepper and spice into the wine.

“At the time we planted about 70 per cent of all white wine drunk in Australia was chardonnay.”

Like most Victorian wine regions, Grampians Estate has had a below-average crop.

“Last year was a really good crop,” Tom said.

“But this year was our smallest chardonnay crop in 10 years.”

Tom processes 30-35 tonnes of grapes a year at the Willaura winery.

“This year we’re only doing 25 tonnes because production was down by about a third,” he said.

The winery buys in 20 per cent of its grapes from nearby vineyards and sells 20 per cent of what it produces to other vineyards.

“We have too much riesling, so we sell some, and we buy in some shiraz,” Tom said.

“We usually buy in some pinot noir from Portland, but we’re not making any pinot noir this year.”

The labels on the bottles include an Arthur Streeton painting of the area.

Grampians Estate produces 1400 cases of wine a year, made by Tom and two other winemakers — Hamish Seabrook and Don Rowe.

All the grapes are hand-picked with help from the local Willaura Football and Netball Club and irrigated via drippers.

“You just get that extra ­5 per cent quality from hand- picked grapes and for us it’s worth it,” Tom said.

The wines are sold through the cellar door at Great Western and through the website, as well as at local and interstate restaurants and wine outlets.

Tom’s family has owned the Willaura property since 1927 and he took it over in 1980.

They now have 9500 ewes and lambs, mainly Corriedale, and no longer keep beef.

The couple’s wine business is still growing and they began exporting in February.

“Sheep are still our main income, but wine has built up to be nearly half the business,” Tom said.

“We’re not planning to increase the vineyards. We have 8ha of vineyards across two holdings that we own and manage and that’s enough for us right now.”

The Guthries will be part of the Grampians Grape Escape festival this weekend at Halls Gap. Visit grampiansgrapeescape.com.au for more information.