The long-awaited moment of the harvest has arrived: in the next few weeks we will begin to reap the fruits of our hard work! Come down to the vineyard with Agricola Marrone, and find out what the month of September has in store for us!
September, harvest time: for us producers it is synonymous with heartbeat, expectations, enthusiasm and emotions…the promise of a new beginning, after so much effort and hard work. As usual, before starting the harvesting phase, we personally went down among our rows, with the aim of observing the maturation phase and state of health of each plant. From Madonna di Como to the Barolo spots, the current state of our vines has left us positively surprised: healthy vineyards, still lush and vigorous, requiring continuous pruning, even a week away from the harvest.
Logically, the optimal point and state of ripeness of the grapes can differ depending on the variety and production area, and it is therefore essential to personally view the state and condition of the fruit, selecting the shoots that we believe are most suitable for winemaking. Some small problems with millerandage – an anomaly of genetic origin which consists in a failure to fertilize the berries and a consequent reduction in the flow of nutrients to the berries – forced us to carry out a second and further sorting of the bunches, however allowing us to leave the plants only the healthiest, sugar-rich bunches. These last sunny days, we are sure, will give a final positive boost to the fruit ripening process.
Returning from the vineyards, we went into the cellar. Presses and crushers are ready: in order to further optimize the selection process of the bunches before pressing and subsequent fermentation, we have equipped the Pellenc crusher – which was talked about so much during the last harvest – with a special tool aimed at widening and distribute the fruits equally on the conveyor belt, ensuring their slow entry into the machine, and offering us greater margin for observation and selection of the best ones.
We are temporarily closing the doors of the cellar, preparing with great emotion to reopen them in a few days for the most important phase of our activity as winemakers and producers. Everything is ready. Mind and heart travel fast, enthusiastically wondering what surprises the 2024 harvest will have in store for us.