Chronicles of the Long Shot Farm

Grape

Harvest 2019

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It’s near the end of October and our 2019 grape harvest is done!  This year was so much better than the rainy mess we had in 2018. We harvested 13.5 tons of grapes at the Long Shot Farm, and Zach and Rachel harvested an additional 1.5 tons at Ripplebrook Vineyard.  We had lots of help from our family and friends as we hand-picked 30,000 lbs of grapes!

We harvested the following grape varieties in 2019:

  • Chambourcin
  • Chardonel
  • Concord
  • Corot Noir
  • Niagara
  • Traminette
  • Vidal Blanc

Check out our harvest season video

   Posted by The Long Shot Farm 

Concord Harvest

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We are in the middle of harvesting our Concord grapes – and ever so thankful for the large walk-in cooler that allows us to store the grapes before crushing them.

Planting more Grapevines

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The last few weekends were spent planting more grapevines. We had prepared the ground already, but still  had to mark the rows, as well as each spot for the vines.  Then we dug out a deep enough hole for each rootcluster.    The first weekend, we planted 200 additional  Traminette vines at  Anja & Duff’s ground, and last  weekend, we planted 150 Chambourcin vines (grafted, on rootstock 3309) at the Long Shot Farm.  Everyone helped and it did not take us that long at all!

Toben (7) helps to make holes for the vines

We must have made some math error because when we were all done, we still had space for another 50 or so vines.  Luckily, Double A Vineyard had sufficient grapes left over, and shipped them out  right away- so those stragglers got planted today.

After we had planted all the vines, we used our plastic layer, and covered them – then we had to go through and poke holes for each new vine to stick out.  We are hoping that this will help in case we run into another drought like last year.

Duff checks out his newly planted Traminettes

Grape Harvest Sequence

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Yesterday we picked the last of our grape variety, the Vidal Blanc.  We should have harvested them 4 days earlier, because the birds got the majority of the grapes in just the last few days 🙁

Here is this year’s chronological grape harvest:

  1. Concord 
  2. Chardonnel, at 21° Brix and a pH of 3.06
  3. Corot Noir
  4. Chambourcin harvest part 1, for making Rosè, at 19.9° brix and a pH of 3.31
  5. Chambourcin harvest part 2, for red wine, 22° Brix, and pH of 3.47
  6. Vidal Blanc, 20.6° Brix and pH of 3.33