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The 2022 Harvest Reports Are In!

35 New Harvest Reports from 2022!
<p>It seems the common thread in 2022 was heat, drought and last minute rains that saved the harvest. Frost, mildew, odium and hail were non-issues for the most part, but once again our growers were faced with extreme, unpredictable weather conditions that are increasingly becoming the norm. Not ones to stand back and take it, many are exploring and adapting, forging what will likely be a new direction for viticulture in the coming generation.</p>
<p>Please head over to the <a href="https://louisdressner.com/harvest-reports">Harvest Report section</a> to read 35 individual recaps of 2022. </p>
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How does The New Website Work?

This is very exciting stuff!
<p><u><strong>Desktop vs Mobile:</strong></u></p>
<p>We know it's 2020 and people use their phones a lot. So we've worked hard on ensuring the site functions well on mobile (especially compared to what it once was). Having said that, desktop is the recommended way of perusing the site.</p>
<p><u><strong>Glossary:</strong></u></p>
<p>At its core, this has always been a website written for wine professionals *attempting* to glean information on the wines we import (and hopefully see a picture of the vigneron's dog). Since the language can be so technical, we've added an <glossary term="glossary" title="1427">interactive glossary</glossary> to the text for those unfamiliar with the baffllingly complex world of wine terminology. Even if you're a seasoned pro, it will frankly teach you a thing or two. And if you'd rather read the content without the glossary, simply head to the main menu bar and turn it off. </p>
<p> <u><strong>Our Wines Section: </strong></u></p>
<p>In the new "Our Wines" section, we've offered a variety of filter categories for you to explore and discover all the cuvées we import. These filters can be combined together to narrow down results. If you hit a wall, simply erase one of the filters or clear all filters. </p>
<p><u><strong>Actual Information About the Wines:</strong></u></p>
<p>Speaking of the wines, the number one complaint we would get from customers was the lack of technical information on the wines themselves. It's not a coincidence that we spend the vast majority of our energy focusing on the people behind the wines and their dogs; it's what we dig about what we do.</p>
<p>Having said that, 95% of the wines we import now have EXTREMELY detailed technical information, dare I say the most technical anywhere on the internet. Please enjoy now while they are up to date, knowing that half of these will probably be totally wrong by next vintage. </p>
<p><u><strong>Search:</strong></u></p>
<p>If you know what producer or wine you are searching for, the search should quickly autofill what you need. Go ahead, give it a whirl.</p>
<p><strong><u>Hyperlinks:</u></strong></p>
<p>Everything on the website has a hyperlink now. This means you can easily share a specific producer page, article, wine or filter combination with anyone. </p>
<p><u><strong>Copy/Paste:</strong></u></p>
<p>If you need to copy/paste anything, the glossary needs to be turned off for the text to paste correctly. Also, if you are going to straight up use our writing verbatim, PLEASE credit us when doing so. Seems obvious but we see it happen all the time. </p>
<p><u><strong>A Shit-Ton of Written Content:</strong></u></p>
<p>The articles themselves can often be very long, and for this reason we developed a Propriety Pop Up System™ where you can easily scroll through various articles/wines and "pop out" to efficiently look at the rest of the content.</p>
<p>We've tried our best to pack as many dog pictures as possible in there, but the digital ink has been spilled: the cumulation of decades' worth of writings from Joe, Denyse, Kevin and Jules is here for you to read. A huge part of the work with this new website was to find better ways to condense and extract essential information you need without getting lost in all that BORING text. </p>
<p>We still think you should check it out. Don't worry, there are plenty of pictures. And you might even find the writing interesting. Or funny. Or both. </p>
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EXPLORE

2022: A Great Vintage for François Cazin
<p>2022 was full of unexpected twists. It was a capricious <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Vintage" title="1109">vintage</glossary><span>,</span></span></span> but finally everything turned out well.</p>
<p>Following the cold mornings in March and early April, we did not suffer significant losses from <glossary term="Frost" title="1135">frost</glossary><span class="zalup"><span><span>.</span></span></span> From May onwards, we had to face a major <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Drought" title="1167">drought</glossary><span>.</span></span></span> Maintaining the land and getting rid of competing grass became essential to preserve resources of remaining water in the soil.</p>
<p><glossary term="Flowering" title="1179">Flowering</glossary> took place under good conditions, but a period of violent storms in late June/early July had us trembling. One in particular was incredibly violent and traversed the <glossary term="Loir-et-Cher" title="601">Loir et Cher</glossary> on June 19th, passing east of <glossary term="Cheverny" title="283">Cheverny</glossary> and severely affecting many of our neighbors in <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Touraine" title="1036">Touraine</glossary><span>.</span></span></span> But we were not touched, save for about 10 minutes of very small hailstones that did not damage our just-formed <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Cluster/Bunch" title="1138">bunches</glossary><span>.</span></span></span></p>
<p>From that period the summer remained dry and hot; the young vines really suffered here. But one positive aspect was that we did not have to worry or protect the vines from <glossary term="Mildew" title="1137">mildew</glossary> from June 20th onwards: this has never happened here before! On the flip-side, we had to keep a maximum of foliage to try and keep the <glossary term="Cluster/Bunch" title="1138">bunches</glossary> covered for risk of them getting sunburned.</p>
<p>We waited until September 5th to begin the <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Harvest" title="521">harvest</glossary><span>,</span></span></span> which was wise as the summer heatwaves began to subside and rain in the very first days of the month benefitted the grapes' <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Maturation" title="639">maturities</glossary><span>.</span></span></span> We had to be quick in <glossary term="Harvest" title="521">harvesting</glossary> the <glossary term="Sauvignon Blanc" title="927">Sauvignon</glossary> before the sugars became too high. With an average <glossary term="Yield" title="1129">yield</glossary> of 3<span class="zalup"><span>0<glossary term="hl/ha" title="528">hl/ha</glossary><span>,</span></span></span> the first juices are quite promising.</p>
<p>The <glossary term="Sauvignon Blanc" title="927">Sauvignons</glossary> were followed by the <glossary term="Pinot Noir" title="805">Pinot</glossary> and <glossary term="Gamay" title="478">Gamay</glossary> - a great <glossary term="Vintage" title="1109">vintage</glossary> for the red grapes, remarkable even for the <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Pinot Noir" title="805">Pinot</glossary><span>:</span></span></span> fantastic grapes, good <glossary term="Tannin" title="1010">tannins</glossary> and color.</p>
<p>To top things off, it was an exceptional <glossary term="Vintage" title="1109">vintage</glossary> for the <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Romorantin" title="867">Romorantin</glossary><span>.</span></span></span> Despite the constant <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Drought" title="1167">drought</glossary><span>,</span></span></span> the <glossary term="Yield" title="1129">yields</glossary> are quite satisfying, 30<glossary term="hl/ha" title="528">hl/ha</glossary> on the <glossary term="Old Vines" title="740">old vines</glossary> and 50<glossary term="hl/ha" title="528">hl/ha</glossary> on the young ones. Despite some very precocious <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Maturation" title="639">maturities</glossary><span>,</span></span></span> the last <glossary term="Parcel" title="760">parcel</glossary> of <glossary term="Romorantin" title="867">Romo</glossary> was picked on October 4th; the <glossary term="Acidity" title="71">acidities</glossary> have been conserved throughout after <glossary term="Fermentation" title="441">fermentation</glossary> and it makes us think we will produce a stand out <span class="zalup"><span><glossary term="Vintage" title="1109">vintage</glossary><span>.</span></span></span></p>
<p>François, Claudie</p>
<p>Henri, Onorine</p>
<p><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/81/6a/816adb54aeeb81770291b6acda6e4881.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/68/b8/68b86da741ebb4f53bdae6b08a68704d.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/90/2b/902bb60b0ba63ad391abd7c1330f352c.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/6d/5c/6d5c53aaca04428459845b45f3c9e9ed.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/5d/8b/5d8ba89128d943299bd93b449285532a.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/6c/ba/6cbaeed2330606f426792c130db04f63.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/5f/5a/5f5a85c90bdb91c1fbab9c8202013d82.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/63/01/63019c1bade6482ab5ca0bf3fe4edcf4.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/5a/9e/5a9e7be04012bcd8776a3b61df6552fe.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/f6/c0/f6c0356029a41bf5b170b40bd3b82a1b.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/b2/d9/b2d964ccc64a4d66fd615cc031515001.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/8e/f1/8ef128c2d4b7610d45c564bd70888c6d.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/08/7b/087ba3f18f78280c43f85a5f60544ef4.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/7c/76/7c76a09568dc456f0b3659d3ba20f3fb.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/f7/22/f722efa7ab10f04973fbfe64be38b38d.jpg" /><img src="https://louisdressner.com/uploads/images/article//966/9d/cd/9dcdab39020c2ab794efdea8389c816a.jpg" /></p>