April 2024

This is the month of bud burst when things are at their most vulnerable to the potential ravages of overnight spring frost.  The month has been cold and wet which has slowed nature down – for which I have been grateful. 

Have we escaped the frost? I thought we had survived the night of -2.5 degrees but a week later I noticed a fair amount of damage in the top half of the chardonnay field. Oh hell. Dave Morris came over and we inspected the damage. He surmised that an air frost had whipped across the fields. We noted that the electricity meter in the chardonnay had consumed less juice than the smaller pinot field which suggested that the automatic thermostat had failed to come on.  The gadget is just not precise enough so next year we will turn it up. I should have run trials before bud burst.  There is no fool like an old one.