The Soil

Varietal plantings include Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Gamay, Pinot Gris, Cabernet Franc, Riesling and an experimental block of Sauvignon Blanc.

Our vineyards were planted over several years, beginning in 2001 with 12 acres. In 2002 an additional 17 acres were planted followed by 15 acres in 2003 and 5 acres in 2004. We did not plant in 2005 or 2006 to give our current vineyards time to mature and develop while we learned how best to farm them. By 2007, with a successful harvest under our belt, we began planting again with another 10 acres. Our total vineyards which encompass 6 distinct blocks Victoria Block, Diana Block, Isabella Block, Gracefield, Northfield and New Vineyard which now total around 60 acres and over 72,000 vinifera vines planted.

Our first vineyard, the one we began planting on Victoria Day 2001, giving rise to its name, Victoria Block. Coincidentally, Victoria is also the name of Bob and Diana Granger’s daughter, making the name even more fitting.

Preparation of this field began in 2000, a process that involved plowing under and cultivating the alfalfa growing there after its first cut. Our reasoning behind this was to reintroduce some nitrogen into the very shallow soils that make up this vineyard. Soil depths range from 12 – 18 inches over most of the field. We were not concerned with the reemergence of the alfalfa because everyone told us it was very fragile and would not survive the plowing and cultivating process. It took us 4 years to manually remove the reemerging alfalfa from this block, however we are happy to report there has been very little in the vineyard this year.

Victoria Block was originally planted with 5,000 Chardonnay vines clone 76 on SO4 and 3,750 Gamay Noir vines clone 509 on SO4 and a small experimental block for Loyalist College. An additional 2,500 Gamay vines were planted in 2004, this time clone 565 in 2002 and a small experimental block of Pinot Noir clone 375 also on SO4 in 2003.

The Gamay in this field will be cropped at around 4 tonnes to the acre although there are years it would like to crop more resulting in production from this field of between 20 and 25 tonnes per year. These grapes are used in our Trumpour’s Mill Gamay Noir a fairly light red made in a Beaujolais style, in our red wine Rosé blended with pinot noir and in the Assemblage Red our version of barbeque wine.

We expect the Chardonnay to crop at around 2.5 tonnes to the acre or about 10 tonnes of fruit per year. It is the fruit from this block that is used to create our barrel fermented chardonnay and it is expected that soon this wine will move to a Grange of Prince Edward label.

Named as a tribute to Diana Granger, Bob’s wife and Caroline’s mother, who has always been the driving force behid the beauty and elegance of the grounds and the glue that holds our family together.

The Diana Block was originally planted in 2001 with 3,250 Pinot Noir vines, clone 777 on SO4. This vineyard has quite a dramatic slope on the west end of the field and a stream on its southern border.

Initially we believed that this combination would offer at least some moderate frost protection in the spring as the rapidly flowing Slab Creek would act to draw the cold air off the slopes and pull it downstream. This theory was only partially effective and the Diana Vineyard was one of the most severely damaged in May of 2005 when Prince Edward County experienced a late spring frost.

An inversion fan was installed in April of 2006, in time to offer protection to the emerging buds of that vintage.

We finished planting Diana with 3,750 vines of Pinot Noir also clone 777 in 2002. It is slated as one of our premium production sites, with crop limited to between 1.5 and 1.8 tonnes to the acre, depending on the vintage. This will result in an average crop of about 9.5 tonnes which will ultimately produce about 500 cases of premium Pinot Noir under the Grange of Prince Edward label.