As my friend from Frogmore Creek, Tony Scherer would say: “It’s Hang Time!”. This that time when there is nothing we can do to the vines. The grapes have all gone through veraison (colour change, or softening to be precise) and their bloom is their natural protection from moulds.
The vineyard is fully netted and the weight of the elevator cables lying on top of their edges holds them down and ensures that no birds get in to damage the fruit. The accidental spin-off from that is that there are no European wasps, as they are unable to breach the skins without help from the birds. And, no attacks on the nets by feral cats at night, hoping to chew up some of the bird life.
So it’s “Hang Time”. We wait for the ripening process to complete and hope that there is no prolonged rainfall to bloat the fruit, reduce the sugars and burst the berries. In continual wet conditions, water is absorbed by the berries through the skin by osmosis and the increased pressure within the berry can burst it. But, there is nothing we can do about that, except walk around the vineyard every morning and fix any holes caused by wallabies who seem to love trotting along the net lying on the ground and defecate on them, untangling any snakes that have been caught. Oh, and pray!
