We started prunning in March. Our strategy was clear from the start: prune as severely as possible to get the best quality of fruit. The principle behind: vigorous pruning will spread the precious minerals and other components that go into the grapes between a small number of lucky bunches.
The saying goes: "it is easy to make bad wine from good grapes, yet you can't make good wine from bad grapes."
Severe pruning will:
1.- maximise the exposure of the leaves to photosyntesis
2.- allow air to circulate and prevent fungal diseases
3.- make the bunches/grapes more accessible for harvesting
And more importantly it will limit the output per vine to a few bunches full of flavour.
The saying goes: "it is easy to make bad wine from good grapes, yet you can't make good wine from bad grapes."
Severe pruning will:
1.- maximise the exposure of the leaves to photosyntesis
2.- allow air to circulate and prevent fungal diseases
3.- make the bunches/grapes more accessible for harvesting
And more importantly it will limit the output per vine to a few bunches full of flavour.
We invested on the best loppers available. It was easy to make clean cuts at the right length even on very old vines.
Fruiting shots are born in 1 year old dormant Buds. The aim is therefore to keep only a couple of 1 year old buds and get rid of the rest. Amongst them we look at the best placed for training along the trellis system used.
We avoid bigger/older canes which are called "bull" canes, thick in diameter, we leave strong looking canes at about the thickness of a pencil. We leave the two remaining spurs at 20-30cm in length.
Once you do it a few times it is simple: out with the old, in with the new. We were lucky to have a glorious few hours of sun during the wettest winter in Spain for years.
Fruiting shots are born in 1 year old dormant Buds. The aim is therefore to keep only a couple of 1 year old buds and get rid of the rest. Amongst them we look at the best placed for training along the trellis system used.
We avoid bigger/older canes which are called "bull" canes, thick in diameter, we leave strong looking canes at about the thickness of a pencil. We leave the two remaining spurs at 20-30cm in length.
Once you do it a few times it is simple: out with the old, in with the new. We were lucky to have a glorious few hours of sun during the wettest winter in Spain for years.
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