Winemaker's Notes

The 2006 growing season, although long and warm, the sunshine hours were lower than normal and the weeks of harvest were cool and damp.The "Moira" vineyard, located in the Beamsville Bench appellation, contains calciferous clay soils and is a certified organic farm planted in pinot noir clone 115 at a density of 1400 vines per acre. Our Moira pinot was thinned to one principal cluster per shoot yielding 1.9 tonnes per acre.

The fruit was selectively hand harvested on September 26 at 21.3° brix, 9.7 g/l titratable acidity and 3.4 pH, and further sorted in the winery to optimize quality. After 2 days cold soaking, the must was allowed to ferment naturally using indigenous yeast. Manually punched down three times per day with extended maceration post fermentation. Gently pressed and racked to tight-grained French oak, medium toasted barrels (33% new). Barrels came from houses Berthomieu, Cadus, Ermitage, and Mercury. The wine went through full malolactic fermentation and aged for 20 months in barrel. Bottled on July 25, 2008 at 12.5% alcohol. Drink now until 2016.