This new vineyard has yet to be planted. Planting will start in the Spring of 2004.
As with the vineyard, this web site is under construction. Progress on both should go hand in hand so watch this space for news of how the vineyard is developing.
The first task is to tidy up the hedges to maximise the area for cultivation. While I'm doing that I need to decide which vines to plant and the trellis system.
Then we need to kill off the grass and weeds in the vineyard rows. The rows will have to be marked out in some way so the the weedkiller is only applied in the rows and not in between.
How it looks today at the end of September 2003
If you look closely you can see my shadow taking the picture, the white thing in the middle is a weather station
We have decided to plough the vine rows, so we have bought a Kubota B7100 compact tractor and a second hand plough
We have also been investigating the properties and condition on the soil, here is the author in the hole
Spring 2004
In the event the Kubota proved to be too small for the sort of machinery a vineyard uses, so we managed to sell the Kubota and buy a proper vineyard tractor - a Fendt 250V. The Fendt is 12 years old but should keep going for another, it has only two wheel drive but as the vineyard is virtually flat that is not a problem.
We are only planting the lower field this year and will plant the other half next year.