We are working our way systematically through the vineyard and fortunately, today was relatively warm for late February. The day ended with a gorgeous sunset:
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| Tina and Jeff pruning away! |
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| Ruger is helping too! |
Sunset Pruning
Chronicles of the Long Shot Farm
Vineyard
Winter View
We started pruning in January and have been working our way through the vineyard. We are done with the Chambourcin barn lot, and nearly done with all of our Vidal Blanc vines. Last week, a snow storm changed into icy rain in the afternoon and left our vines encased in ice:
Easter Egg Hunt in the Vineyard
This may well be the Easter egg hunt to start an annual tradition:
The Mulch Spreader
Anja and Duff bought a brand new mulch spreader, from Millcreek Manufacturing, and it was delivered to the farm this morning. We will be using it on all three vineyards, which are fortunately located within a half mile radius. It took us two days to mulch six acres of grapevines. And the mulch pile, which we had been amassing for two years, dwindled to nothing!
Here is a link to a video showing how it works.
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| Beautifully mulched grapevines!! |
Planting more Grapevines
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!
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| 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.
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| Duff checks out his newly planted Traminettes |
