We experienced record heat in Northern California over the weekend. At Hirsch we hit a heatwave high of 104 on Saturday. My father said he can't recall a harvest this warm at Hirsch. The consequences for the fruit has been significant in some blocks, minor in others. We've seen a lot of dehydration in the grapes, causing brix (sugar) and acid both to rise due to concentration of solids. In a few places, we had significant raisining. Those raisins need to be cut off and/or sorted out, increasing labor and lowering yields. It may not be trendy to say this, but I could not be more grateful for irrigation. Watering the vines before and during this record-breaking heat helped to preserve the integrity of the berries, as well as to prevent the vines from shutting down metabolically. My gratitude to our vineyard and winemaking team for their proactive response to the heat. It's not all dire. It's remarkable how well many of the blocks held up. For example, the stressed, virused vines in Block 7 (the foundation block of our West Ridge Pinot Noir) held up amazingly, and this despite tiny berry size. And it cooled off dramatically last night, bringing a welcome end to what has been a stressful and confounding weather pattern. Pictures show, from first to last: - Partially dehydrated cluster - Cluster with pronounced raisining - Clusters unaffected by the heat in Block 7 [all cluster photos taken on the same day] - Max daily temps since 8/1 from varied Sonoma County weather stations; Hirsch is the light blue line - Max daily temps since 8/1 at Hirsch

Jasmine Hirschさん(@jasminehirsch)がシェアした投稿 -


先週、カリフォルニアに熱波が訪れるという記事を書きましたが、ソノマのヒールズバーグで114F（46℃）、モントレーのサリナスで107F（42℃）、サンフランシスコでさえも106F（41℃）と、各地で最高気温を更新したそうです。

ブドウはこれだけの暑さになると、熟成を止め、水分を失っていってしまいます。冒頭の写真はソノマ・コーストのハーシュ・ヴィンヤーズ（Hirsch Vineyards）のものですが、ブロックによってはかなりの被害があったようです。

一方で、灌漑によって救われたブロックもかなりあるとのことで、ときには悪者扱いされてしまう灌漑は、カリフォルニアにおいてはやはり必要な設備といえそうです。

また、この熱波で収穫を急いだ生産者も多くいますが、糖度は急速にあがったもののフレーバーがまだ追いついていなかったというブドウもあったようで、ワイナリーによっては今年のワインの品質にも影響がありそうです。

今年は問題の少ないシーズンになりそうと思っていましたが、とんだ伏兵がいましたね。