THE VINEYARD

The Site

 

On the Skyline Ridge of the Santa Cruz Mountains at 2600 feet, we're above the fog line overlooking the south slopes of the mountains and distant Monterey Bay. the mountains and ocean combine to provide the right combination of warm days with cool nights.  The soils are well-drained with sandy loam on top of crumbling sandstone from an ancient seabed. 

 

Our Practices

 

For optimum vine health and grape quality, we train the vines using the Vertical Positioning System (VSP) and both spur and cane pruning. We work the vines by hand and during the growing season we spend plenty of time with each vine using multiple passes. We remove excess growth and leaves to allow for air flow and a dappling of sun on the grapes to help prevent fungus and for best grape flavor development.  We don't subscribe to hedging and any mechanical methods of pruning or picking.

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In 2022 when we began preparing our soils in our new Skyline vineyard, we switched to only using organic matter and zero fertilizer to amend our soils.  We also curtailed the use of tilling in order to protect the soil microbiome. Irrigation was put into the new vineyard strictly for helping new and replacement vines. 

 

Between rows we keep nature in play and allow native ground cover to form to allow for a natural balance that precludes the need to spray for harmful insects.  The vines have been trained for deep roots and we use no irrigation on established vines.