Clos du Fief's 2012 Harvest Report.

by Michel Tête, October 3rd, 2012

We started harvesting (all by hand) on September 17th and finished the 25th. The weather was nice and dry, save for a little rainfall one night.

It was a lot of hard work for the Gamay this year, because so many clusters were very small and thus hard to harvest. Yields are low this year (about 30 hl/h), but with nice maturities (12 to 14 alcohol). Acidities are nice and will assure proper maceration, so we'll have a good extraction of color and tannin.

For our white Beaujolais Villages, the harvest was more fruitful despite some odium issues (which led to heavy sorting of the grapes). The vinifications for both are going smoothly, and we're getting a lot of pleasant aromas already!