Rouge-Bleu

Carignan vine "épamprée"

Dear wine lovers,

May is when the vines grow at their fastest and some grape varieties, like Carignan, need to be "épamprée".

In effect, even if the pruning was very short, 3 or 4 new vines shoots per "porteur" (where the new vine shoots start from) are usual with this variety. In order leave air circulate inside the vines and around the grapes and in order to give to the leftover vine shoots more energy, it is necessary to eliminate some vines shoots. At this time, the amount of future grapes is just on potential but since any weather event could happen before the harvest. It is then important to both eliminate some vines shoots called "gourmands" since they don't hold grapes and then make sure to leave enough grapes in case some bad events damage them naturally.

Besides this "épamprage", I also planted some "phacélie" and some "seigle" in order to prepare a parcel to be planted with baby vines this fall. These plants both have tow great assets. : They naturally disinfect the underground from old roots and can be "paturées" by sheeps this fall who will also amend the soil whil eating.

At last, our future cellar is almost done. My brother Jacques who is an expert with plaster boards is giving his best, contributing also to the success of our venture.

I keep on seeing lot's of ladybugs in the vines which always please me. Today, strong Mistral is back in the Rhône...It might make damages in the vines. More info about it at next edition...

Cheers,

Jean-Marc Espinasse - Domaine Rouge-Bleu

Our "décavailloneuse"

Dear wine lovers,

I am often "amused" when I hear some vine owners say : My vines are "clean". For them, it means than there are no "bad herbs" and the reason they think this way is because they have been "brainclean" by "Mr Roundup".

Of course, those "bad herbs" might eventually take some water from the vines which will make them suffer more but this is for the best of the grapes and eventually those bad herbs will disintegrate, contribute to the microbial soil life and give natural food to the vines.

In order to regulate those herbs, I have chosen to use a traditional "décavailloneuse" used by ancients before "Mr Roundup" decided that a dead soil would be better to the vines. The result is great even if the use is not that easy to use + takes a lot of time since you don't want to damage the vines with the tools. But this is for he best and I am sure our dear vines will appreciate the effort.

Our vines keep growing fast. Some of them are about to flower and the bees we now have might welcome should be able to find abundant food to feed the Queen, themselves and, why not, give us a small amount of honey. The future grapes start to take shape and I continue to see ladybugs which always pleases me so much.

At last, our cellar is almost ready to welcome the tanks. When they are, I will almost feel like this queen in its bee house !

Cheers,

Jean-Marc Espinasse - Domaine Rouge-Bleu

Unwanted vine shoot which will be "ébourgeonnée"

Dear wine lovers,

Last week, we had the joy to have "beau temps" (nice weather) which actually now means that it rained the whole week !

110 mm in 5 days, about what we got since the beginning of the year, this is just gold. And the rain came at the right time, when the vines growi about 110 mm a day and just when I needed to worry about watering our new baby vines just planted a few weeks ago.

The new issue now is to know if we are going to come back soon to hot weather which means a lot of humidity in the vines and development of fungus such as Mildiou. But since the mistral is now blowing, it dries the soil, preventing naturaly this bad disease, which will make us the economy of a copper treatment. And this same mistral is even helping with ébourgeonnage since it breaks those unwanted bad vine shoots. See how Mother Nature does a great job...

And in order to prevent the wind to break too much weak vine shoots (especially for Syrah) we have to put down the wires that are surrounding them like my son Maxime does here.

Before that blessed rain, time had been dedicated to "ébourgeonage", which means to take off the new green vine shoots that are not wanted. In effect, the vine would dedicate a part of its energy to produce an unfertile vine shoot instead of putting its power in the future grapes.

In the meantime, our future cellar is taking shape and the new soil which will welcome our tanks is almost done.

At last, Rouge-Bleu is proud the welcome its very first bee house. If all goes well, it will host a queen tomorow.

Cheers,

Jean-Marc Espinasse - Domaine Rouge-Bleu