The 500 Milestone

Troon winemaker Nate Wall filling cow horns with fresh organic manure

You start with dung and end with humus. Newton was right, alchemy exists. What was worthless becomes gold. A concentrated collection of fungi and bacteria to inoculate our soils. This is not magic, just good bugs. 

We mark significant progress towards goals by celebrating milestones, events that measure our progress. Milestones should be recognized and remembered as you strive towards your goal. Some milestones are hard to measure, but in this case the achievement was very clear. Six months ago at Troon Vineyard we placed raw manure into some cow horns and last week we dug them up and out came soil - humus. The production of your first BD 500 is always a milestone for a Biodynamic farmer.

Why do you have to bury the manure in cow horns? The honest answer is that we don’t know, but we do know that no other container has successfully transformed manure into this important soil inoculate. Maria Thun, in her seeming endless research on all things Biodynamic tried to use other containers, but none produced the same results. For whatever reason, the cow horns are the only known container that transforms raw manure to the rich humus that is BD 500. Rudolf Steiner thought the cow horns channeled the power of the Universe into the manure. Personally, I believe that fermenting manure does not require quite that much energy. The fungi and bacteria are already here just waiting to do their jobs if given the proper opportunity. Right now, the cow horns do the best job of creating just the right environment for them to do their work. Perhaps in the future other containers will be discovered. 

The process of making BD 500 is actually quite simple. Last fall we gathered some very, very fresh cow manure from the pastures of Noble Dairy, our organic next-door neighbor (a great project for our harvest interns) and simply filled the cow horns with the fresh manure. The cow horns themselves came from the Josephine Porter Institute, perhaps the premier supplier for the Biodynamic farmer. Then we buried them last fall and dug them up early this summer. The transformation may seem magical, but it’s not as this is what the microbes in our soil do and all we did was provide them an opportunity to do their work in particularly pleasant conditions. 

So often we use mystical excuses to explain things we do not understand and there is still a lot we do not understand. Science and agriculture have had a difficult relationship. All too often, most scientific research focused on simply making more as bigger harvests promise more profit. The situation worsened as Big Ag took over the world. Quantity not quality generated the funding for most research with predictable results. In his book The Third Plate, chef Dan Barber relates the tale of university researchers being offered commissions by Monsanto to create wheat that was resistant to Roundup so that more of their product could be applied to grain on the way to a bakery near you.

Fortunately, things are changing and the microbiome of soil is the hot “new” topic being pursued by researchers. Many think what winegrowers have been calling terroir for centuries is actually more defined by the soil’s microbiome than the type of soil the vine is growing in. One thing for sure is that vines cannot take their nutrition from the soil without their mycorrhizal partners. The goal of Biodynamic farming is to build this natural balance in our soils. Healthy vines can handle many of the things Mother Nature throws their way without our help. In fact, often “our help” makes things worse for them. For some reason, we humans assume we know more about ripening grapes than grapevines do. 

After harvest this fall, our own BD 500 will be applied to our soils. There are those in Biodynamics that believe elemental beings are at work among their plants. I believe in them too. However, not the gnomes and such that some followers of Steiner believe in. The real elemental beings are the fungi and bacteria that work the real magic in the vineyard and are elemental to life itself. When we apply BD 500 to our soils we are just bringing more of those elemental beings to the party. 

Milestones are worthy of celebration and rituals. As a group, we gathered to fill and bury our horns and then again when we dug up the finished BD 500. We will all gather and celebrate again when we apply our own BD 500 to our vineyard this fall. We all come together to celebrate our milestones as we bring Troon Vineyard back to life.

In Biodynamics, the people are elemental beings too.

Freshly filled cow horns being prepared to be buried

Planting New Vineyards at Troon - Hands

It was before 6 a.m., but there were already a lot of holes. Dawn had not broken, but a dim light was just starting to flow over the mountains. Hundreds of holes had already been dug. Around thirty people moved their spades rhythmically, almost silently, as they dug twelve-inch holes, one after another. This is how you plant, or should I say, how they plant a vineyard.

Last week at Troon Vineyard in Oregon’s Applegate Valley, we planted about a third of the vines we need to plant this month. That was over four thousand holes, dug by hand in less than two day’s work. But digging the hole was only the beginning. Once the holes are dug, they must each receive, by hand, a shovel full of Biodynamic compost mixed with Azomite and Calphos and then a vine needs to be dropped in each hole. On each vine, the biodegradable root cover had to be removed by hand due to the requirements of our organic certification. Then, on their knees, with their hands, each hole is filled and the vine is in its new home.

One day these vines will give birth to wines served in some of the best restaurants in the world. But it is these people in the pre-dawn hours with their spades and on their hands and knees that brought these vines to live in this vineyard.

Winery tours and articles like to feature barrels, tanks, and machines, but it is the hands of the people that craft them that make wines of place come to life. From the moment the vines are planted, to when they are tended in the vineyards, to the cellar work that turns grapes into wine, the best wines are handmade wines.

Hands, not things make memorable wines. Hands hold the spades that dug the holes to plant them, hands shovel the compost to help them grow, hands prune and position the shoots as they grow, hands pick the grapes, hands sort the fruit that arrives at the winery and hands hold the glasses when it’s time to savor the hand labor that put the wine in those glasses. Making and enjoying wine is a hands-on experience.

The thousands of holes dug by dozens of hands will start to produce wine in three years. Many hands will touch each of these vines as they grow over the next years. Your delight and pleasure in the wine they will one day produce will be the result of the work those hands. Hand to hand to hand and, finally, to the glass in your hand.

Wines of place, with terroir, touch you because of the many touches that have brought the wine to you.

Planting grenache noir at Troon Vineyard  

Placing new vines one-by-one in the freshly dug holes. Each of the wrappers on the roots also had to be removed.

Planting New Vineyards at Troon - Getting to Know You

Standing there looking at the now real Troon Vineyard block 9, newly planted with mourvèdre, was an emotional experience. So much planning, work and investment transformed from an idea into a vineyard. There in front of me, I could finally feel the wine that would come from these vines. Putting a plant in the ground that hopefully will be producing wines long after I’m gone is a very different experience than planting a crop that will be replaced after one season. But it was the day before that we got to know each of these vines.

The process of preparing these vines for their new home begins the day before planting. Troon winemaker Nate Wall and assistant winemaker Cary Willeford and I spent the day preparing and applying a series of Biodynamic Preparations to the new plants. First was Biodynamic Barrel Compost, which we dynamized for twenty minutes by hand before applying to the roots of each plant to give their microbiome a head start. Meanwhile, we had been preparing a tea of Biodynamic Preparation 508 (equisetum or horsetail).  Which was also dynamized by hand then sprayed on the leaves and graft junctions. This preparation helps the plant ward off fungal diseases like powdery mildew. The time, care and intention that went into this process I believe are integral to what makes Biodynamics such a powerful agricultural system. The culture we built by providing care and attention to each plant changes our relationship to them and to each other.

Biodynamics achieves many goals. Your soils are healthier, your plants are healthier, your fruit tastes better, your wine is better and, obviously, its better for the environment. It is a lot of work, but it is also a lot of fun. You feel good about what you’re doing everyone feels pride in a shared worthwhile endeavor.

Yesterday afternoon all of our existing vineyards were also treated with Biodynamic Barrel Compost, we did not want them to feel left out. After all, plants do talk to each other you know.

Troon assistant winemaker Cary Willeford and winemaker Nate Wall apply Biodynamic Barrel Compost to the roots of the new vines. 

Planting New Vineyards at Troon - It Only Looks Like the Beginning

New vines arrived at Troon Vineyard yesterday from Inland Desert Nursery in Washington - mourvèdre, grenache noir and marsanne all neatly packed into shipping boxes. Next week more classic southern French varieties will arrive and within the next ten days, we’ll have planted over 14,000 vines to create ten new acres of vineyard.

Stacked in their shipping boxes they look like the beginning of a project, but it only looks that way. This project started a year and a half ago and the arrival of the vines themselves is closer to the end than the beginning of the project of planting a vineyard. The first step was extensive soil studies as Vineyard Soil Technologies dug more than seventy five-feet deep soil pits to create detailed soil profiles. Based on that data we selected ten acres as ideal for vineyard development. Combining the soil data and climate data with our experience we selected the varieties we felt would be best matched to each vineyard block to be developed. We then begin working with Inland Desert Nursery to obtain the clones of the varieties we chose to focus on. The varieties we were looking for are not the most popular so ordering from the nursery long in advance is required.

Planting does not begin with plants. First, there was the soil work and that filled most of the last year and a half. Once the blocks to be planted were identified the ground had to be prepared. That meant heavy equipment as a D8 ripped the ground to a depth of thirty-six inches. Prior to the ripping, we applied five tons per acre of organic compost along with other soil amendments that we discovered were required by our soil studies. This was followed by discing then yet another finishing discing. When the soil was prepared we seeded a specifically designed cover crop to add nutrition to the soil. As Biodynamic farmers, we also did our first application of Biodynamic Preparation 500.

Over the winter and spring, the cover crop prospered. This was then mowed, then disced into the soil as green manure. Then the vineyard begin to take form as we put in end posts, stakes for each vine (head-trained vines) and irrigation tubes for the soon to arrive young, and very thirsty vines. In addition, another application of Biodynamic preparation 500 was applied to both the blocks to be planted along with all existing vineyard blocks.

Only after all of this investment and work did we arrive at last Friday, when the first vines arrived. Their arrival was the culmination of all of this work, not the beginning. However, these vines mark the beginning of new wines that will come from the grapes they will yield. In that sense, they are truly a new beginning for Troon Vineyard.

As you see, the plan for planting these new acres at Troon was built upon scientific research, extensive viticultural experience, the principles of Biodynamic agriculture and on a vision to make wines with a unique character defined by our soils and the climate on the Kubli Bench in Oregon's Applegate Valley.

Over the next weeks, I will be documenting the process of planting these new vines at Troon Vineyard in words and images. I invite you to share that process with us as we build a foundation for a new generation of wines at Troon.

Taking the Parking Lot Back to Paradise

 Hey farmer farmer

Put away that D.D.T. now

Give me spots on my apples

But leave me the birds and the bees

Please

Don't it always seem to go

That you don't know what you've got

'Till it's gone

They paved paradise

And put up a parking lot

• Joni Mitchell, Big Yellow Taxi

I felt like I was walking on blacktop. Hard, hot and lifeless it looked like a place where a parking attendant would work, not a farmer. But this was a vineyard. Each vine looked like it was a weed growing out of cracks in the blacktop on some worn parking lot.

Living soil gives life. In this vineyard the soil was dead and the vines were dying. Yet, it was a beautiful site and the vines were giving some good wines even as they struggled to survive. They deserved better.

There seemed only one route back to health that could provide the opportunity to make the wines I believed we had the potential to produce. That path was biodynamics, which is the best existing framework for regenerative agriculture. To craft the wines we aspired to make, our soils, indeed our entire farm needed regeneration. It is never just the soil that needs regeneration, but also the spirit. At Troon, not only our soils were abused.

How was a vineyard transformed into a parking lot? Only through the abuses of industrial, thoughtless farming can soil be so decimated. Sick soils make sick plants and these poor vines were overcome with viruses and fungal diseases that stronger plants could have resisted. It became our mission to bring them back to health so they could live out their remaining years doing what Mother Nature intended them to do with their lives - ripen grapes.

Then there is intention, perhaps the key to regenerative agriculture. Previously their intent was to extract all they could from the land and extract they did. Today our mission is to give back more than we take. To be a good farmer you must work for the farmers who will farm the land in the future with the same fervor you work for yourself.

The path from parking lot to vineyard started with science. We did extensive soil studies with Vineyard Soil Technologies and worked with Biomemakers to establish a complete cross-section of our vineyard microbiome through genetic sequencing. To know where you need to go, you first have to know where you are.

Then came the proactive part - biodynamics. The essence of biodynamics is building healthy soils. The main tool in the biodynamic toolbox is compost. Over the last years we have been applying tons of biodynamic compost to our vineyards. In addition to the compost, now that chemicals were eradicated and weed control was returned to manual methods our soils began to change, the microbiome bloomed. Today you can walk into our vineyard and easily dig your hands into healthy arable soil.

That parking lot has been replaced by paradise - a vineyard.

Wine as a Spectator Sport

Yes, I was turned down by the Wine Spectator, they just don’t have the time or, apparently the funds, to taste one of our wines this year.

Hello Craig,

• Thank you for your email and interest in submitting. Given tasting budgets, the small case production and editorial constraints, we will not be able to include this wine in our tastings this year. You're welcome to contact us again next year, with your new vintage, and we can consider the wine again at that time.

After five years of abstinence, I thought I would give the Wine Spectator another go. It was against my better judgement. After all, this is a publication that is focused on green-washed industrial wines. Larger producers with slick PR departments and large advertising budgets are are good to go. A wine with small production is simply an irritation for them. What you have to remember about the Wine Spectator is they’re not in the wine business, they’re in the magazine business. I have to agree with them, a three hundred case production of a viognier, marsanne, roussanne blend from a biodynamic vineyard in Oregon’s Applegate Valley is not going to sell many magazines for them. The publisher sees wine, spirits, cigars and now cannabis as simply as resources to be mined. Certainly they employ talented writers who are serious about their craft. It reminds of that old saw about Playboy Magazine, “I just read it for the articles.” Yes there are many good articles, but points are the real centerfolds and what sells the magazine.

This is why I have always been such an avid supporter of wine bloggers. First they taste wines like they were meant to be tasted. They take time with them, experience how they evolve in the glass and taste them with food. Wine bloggers are not wine spectators as they are fully immersed in the joys that wine can bring to life and communicate that energy to their readers.

Yes I know the Wine Spectator will claim they cover small producers and statistically I’m sure that’s true, but it’s also true they only do so when they feel it can be of benefit to them. Wine bloggers share their joy of wine, the Wine Spectator extracts joy and turns it into profit.

Thanks to the Wine Spectator for at least turning my samples down with an actual reply. Don’t worry, I won’t bother you again.

More Biodynamic Fake News...

Harvest 2018 at Troon Vineyard in Oregon’s Applegate Valley.

Tired old canards. When will the media get on board with modern biodynamics? While the article Weighing Up the Value of Biodynamic Wine by Vicki Denig addresses valid concerns, once again the sources for the article are either misinformed or have an ax to grind. Here is a link to the original article:

https://www.wine-searcher.com/m/2019/04/weighing-up-the-value-of-biodynamic-wine?rss=Y

“Couple that with calendar-specific workdays and strict following of the lunar cycle, and even the smallest of vineyards would face significant time restraints and financial challenges. So when a sizeable estate decides to go biodynamic, is it actually achievable?”

“However, not all winemakers are convinced. In Crete, Giannis Stilianou, winemaker and owner of Stilianou Wines, explains that with larger properties, cultivating with biodynamic principles is nearly impossible, mainly because farmers are only permitted to execute vineyard work on a small amount of very specific days”

The Demeter standard for wines states, “Observation of the Biodynamic calendar is encouraged.” It does not demand only “calendar-specific work days or that “farmers are only permitted to execute vineyard work...on very specific days.” The statements above are false and following the biodynamic calendar is not required for Demeter Certification.

The work of all the biodynamic farmers I know is focused on regenerative agriculture. Their goal is to build the health of their soils and plants. In trying to follow the biodynamic calendar we are reaching for the very peak of quality. That extra edge that pushes our wines beyond just being delicious to becoming truly alive in the glass. If you can’t prune or pick on the ideal day due to weather and practical considerations you know that all of the other work you’ve done will still make exceptional wine. What we reach for by trying to do our work on certain days, by paying attention to the natural cycle of the Moon, is to go beyond simply delicious and make a wine that sings of the vineyard itself. A wine that is transparent and living.

“And for others, size isn't even the biggest issue. Stu Smith, partner and enologist at St. Helena-based Smith-Madrone Vineyards dug deep into the world of biodynamics – and still wasn't convinced. "I discovered that Rudolf Steiner had never been a farmer," he says, noting that Steiner went from student to agricultural theorist, without any experience in the field. Smith explains that when he'd challenge biodynamic farmers on their lack of trials and published results, their response was always that it's a belief system.”

Mr. Smith “discovered” that Rudolf Steiner had never been a farmer. Digging deep? An amazing discovery? I think not. Rudolf Steiner is famous for being a philosopher and founding the Waldorf schools, not for being a farmer, as a quick look at Wikipedia will show you. What we today call biodynamics was only outlined by Steiner in a series of lectures in 1924. He did not go from “student to agricultural theorist”, but gave the lectures at the end of his life at the request of a group of farmers. The modern practice of biodynamics has been built after his death on the experience and experiments of several generations of biodynamic farmers. None of the biodynamic wine growers I personally know consider biodynamic farming a “belief system”, but see it as a framework to build on with a goal of taking their farming to a new level. Contrary to what Mr. Smith may believe, Nicolas Joly is not your typical biodynamic winegrower.

“Smith also takes issue with what he deems to be close-mindedness amongst biodynamic farmers, from both large and small estates. "They are the only group out there that says 'our way is the only way, and everyone else is doing it wrong'. Organic and sustainable farmers don't do that, but biodynamic farmers do."

This, simply, is total bullshit.

“And when it comes down to it, Smith sees it all as a fast-track to making money. "There are so many wineries that need to find their place in the sun," he says, calling out the appeal of biodynamics to Millennial consumers. "In my opinion, it's a marketing ploy – do you see biodynamic carrots? Lettuce? Peaches? No. They're doing it in wine in America as a marketing concept so they sell their product easier and get a higher price for it."

Yes, Mr. Smith, you do see biodynamic carrots, lettuce, and peaches, just not enough of them. The reason you see few of these biodynamically certified fruits vegetables and wines is that practicing biodynamics is hard work and unlikely to reward with you with enough additional profit to justify the effort. You choose biodynamics because of a commitment to reach for something special. Demeter USA currently has certification protocols for Fruit and Vegetables; Nuts, Seeds and Kernels; Bread, Cakes and Pastries; Grain, Cereal, Tofu and Pasta; Herbs and Spices; Meat; Dairy; Oils and Fats; Sweetening Agents, Confectionary, Ice Cream, Chocolate; Cosmetics and Body Care; Textiles; Wine; Beer; Spirits; Cider and Fruit Wines; Infant Formula. It seems he is shopping in the wrong markets, perhaps he should give Google a try?

Then there is his “marketing ploy” statement, which any accountant for a biodynamic winery would get a big laugh over.

“Others think that many biodynamic practices are, frankly, bullshit.”

I'll tell you the real bullshit. It’s farming with chemicals that destroy the environment and cause cancer. It’s making boring industrial wine. If a little voodoo will save the planet, count me in. Voodoo is just what people call something they don’t understand.

Looking at Steiner in the Rearview Mirror

Rudolf Steiner gave his agricultural lectures, the beginning of biodynamics, in 1924. There were eight lectures over thirteen days given to a group of over one hundred farmers. He died in 1925. During the last of the agricultural lectures he said, “I am in entire agreement with the strict resolve which has been made by our farmer friends here present, namely, that what has been given here to all those partaking in the Course shall remain for the present within the farmers' circle. They will enhance it and develop it by actual experiments and tests. The farmers' society — the “Experimental Circle” that has been formed — will fix the point of time when in its judgment the tests and experiments are far enough advanced to allow these things to be published."

Here are some discoveries that happened from 1924, when Steiner gave the agricultural lectures and the five years after his death in 1925:

1924 – Wolfgang Pauli: quantum Pauli exclusion principle

1924 – Edwin Hubble: the discovery that the Milky Way is just one of many galaxies

1925 – Erwin Schrödinger: Schrödinger equation (Quantum mechanics)

1925 – Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin: Discovery of the composition of the Sun and that Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the Universe

1927 – Werner Heisenberg: Uncertainty principle (Quantum mechanics)

1927 – Georges Lemaître: Theory of the Big Bang

1928 – Paul Dirac: Dirac equation (Quantum mechanics)

1929 – Edwin Hubble: Hubble's law of the expanding universe

1929 – Alexander Fleming: Penicillin, the first beta-lactam antibiotic

1929 – Lars Onsager's reciprocal relations, a potential fourth law of thermodynamics

1930 – Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar discovers his eponymous limit of the maximum mass of a white dwarf star

There was a lot Steiner and his compatriots did not know in 1924. What they did know was that the new chemical farming strategies that were taking over the world were destroying the land and our food. They may not have known why, but they knew something was wrong. At least they had the courage to seek a solution.

To take a frightening hypothetical, suppose you were diagnosed with cancer tomorrow. Would you want to be treated by a doctor with the knowledge that existed in 1920 or one armed with all the knowledge acquired in the last one hundred years? I think farmers should make the same argument when it comes to Steiner and biodynamics . We need to build on the wisdom of the past and it is our job to push that knowledge forward. We need not be held back by their ignorance nor condemn them for it - they knew what they knew and no more, just like us. Future generations will find us as ignorant as we find those that came before us.

Steiner clearly identified the problem and outlined an answer, but he was locked in a world that was not only in chaos after World War I, but in an era where modern science and new knowledge was exploding. His answer was to reach back and there was true wisdom in that when it came to farming. However, we must take Steiner’s world into consideration when evaluating his solutions. It is always wise to question the wisdom of your gurus. Much of what we call biodynamics today has little to do with Steiner. Names like Maria Thun, Herbert Koepf, Ehrenfried Pfeiffer and Manfred Klett established the liturgy of biodynamics. They took Steiner’s outline, then left it behind. We should do the same to them.

Steiner may not have known there were other galaxies or that the universe was expanding, but he did understand there were problems down on the farm. His ideas created a framework to build upon. He expected us to build on it, not leave his lectures frozen in time. Our job as biodynamic farmers is to continue the experiments as he requested until we find why biodynamics works, which it does. The problem right now is that we do not know the parts of biodynamics that work and those that don’t. Does every preparation work as he described? Of course not. Yet, there is something clearly working here and in the face of climate change we better figure out what works. There are no gnomes out there in the vineyard, but there are fungi and bacteria and in them we will find the real magic that makes biodynamics work. Are there Elemental Beings? Of course there are, they are just microscopic. 

The ultimate expression of biodynamics is when you go beyond it and craft the right solutions for your farm. Striving for Demeter certification is like a jazz musician practicing scales over and over again. It is only after they master their instrument that they can improvise and truly create something new. 

The next iteration of biodynamics is already in motion. People like Kevin Chambers at Koosah Farm and Ted Lemon at Littorai Wines are already moving beyond biodynamics to find new expressions of the preparations born of their direct experience on their farms. Practical biodynamics is being being taught to farmers (like us at Troon) by consultant Andrew Beedy, who was mentored by the famed Alan York. The practice of biodynamics has been and always will be evolving. 

What Steiner said in the agricultural lectures was meaningful, insightful and important in the maelstrom that was Europe in 1924. In the almost one hundred years since the lectures, we have learned a lot. It is our role as farmers to meld the insights of the past with the knowledge of today and to build a foundation for the future. That is the essence of biodynamics. Seeking truth and building a relationship with our planet and our place in the Universe is both a spiritual quest and a commercial one. Steiner is of the past, but biodynamics is of the future. What biodynamics will become is yet to be discovered. 

Steiner would have loved quantum physics. The uncertainty principle Is very biodynamic.

Killing our Palates

Sriracha, Aioli, Pesto: the holy trinity of corporate cuisine. They’re on almost everything and I would not be shocked to see a Sriracha and Pesto Aioli on a sandwich these days. In most kitchens the main purpose of these sauces are to cover up less than interesting ingredients - culinary sleight of hand. Is simple mayonnaise a thing of the past? After our palates are dulled with such an onslaught of flavors it is no wonder we can’t actually taste wines with delicate, elegant flavors.

Don’t get me wrong, individually and with the right dishes each of these sauces are delicious, but each has been co-opted to the point that these superb, classic sauces not only seem cliché, but have become layered on top of each other so garlic or heat alone are the only song a dish sings.

Is there any use of basil more perfect than pasta with pesto in Liguria? Delicate, bright and fresh with just the right touch of garlic? Then there is aïoli garni in Provence, the ultimate dip again with the perfect touch of garlic and fresh, fruity olive oil to dip boiled fresh vegetables, olives, salt cod and whatever you please in to. Then there is sriracha, a Thai sauce. The Huy Foods Sriracha brand (the only one most Americans know) was first introduced to the USA in the 1980s when it was served at virtually all American Pho restaurants. Today it’s in or on everything and at this point I would not be shocked to see sriracha toothpaste.

Americans can not leave well enough alone. We must do something to everything. It’s not enough to have a subtle, beautiful pesto we have to add more-and-more garlic so the basil becomes irrelevant. The same thing happens with aioli and then you end up with the ultimate bastardization a pesto aioli. Simple and elegant is not a characteristic admired by Americans.

American winemaking has also been sucked into this wormhole and winemakers think more about what they can add instead of getting out of the way and letting the grapes and vineyard tell their own story. In the same way some bastardized version of aioli obliterates the other flavors in a sandwich, winemakers here can’t resist aggressive commercial yeasts, new oak and a host of other interventions that are the winemaker’s version of a chef adding too much garlic or hot sauce. Winemaking, like a sauce, should elevate and brighten, not overwhelm.

There can be great complexity in simplicity.

Laptop-less

I’m trying to remember how long its been? Could it be thirty years? It's damn close. Over those decades I've never traveled anywhere without my laptop - until now. For the better part of the last two weeks I've just traveled with an iPad along with a smart keyboard. Perhaps that's not such a big deal as, now that I think about, this iPad is far more powerful than probably 95% of those old computers. Now that I've done it, I can't imagine lugging around a laptop on road trips again. These new iPads are the ultimate road warrior machines.

I almost felt that I'd forgotten something at times without that weight on my shoulders as I raced through the airport to catch a flight. The iPad feels more or less weightless nestled in a small, also very light, messenger bag. Honestly, the feeling of liberation was wonderful.

A key element to making the iPad really work for you is that when you only have it to work on you actually start digging in and really discovering how powerful it can be - and powerful it is.

This certainly does not mean I no longer love my Mac, for pure power work there is nothing better. However, the truth is when I'm on the road I never have the time to sit there and pound out eight hours of work like I do when I'm in the office. When traveling I'm grabbing moments in airports and hotels just getting done what needs to be done. Also, it is impossible to beat the convenience of an always on cellular connection as finding wifi becomes a thing of the past.

When I think back to my struggles for connectivity and portability in the past I can only marvel at how far technology has come. We no longer have any excuses for productivity except ourselves.

Biodynamic Fake News

It’s not their fault, but you see it every week. Fine wine writers printing misconceptions and flat-out wrong information on biodynamics - yes, fake news.

It’s not their fault, it’s ours. Those of us who farm wine grapes biodynamically are not doing a good job of getting out the real story. That could be because the biodynamic movement is not a monolith, but a complicated web with divergent branches and diverse self-interests. That makes for a muddled message and creates an information issue biodynamic winegrowers have to confront. While there may be divergent opinions and methods within the biodynamic community, all share a common final goal.

Here are some random recent examples of the media muffing biodynamics. The authors and publications are irrelevant as inaccuracies like these are more the rule than the exception.

”And if you’ve heard of one thing to do with biodynamics, it is probably that cow horns filled with fermented cow manure are buried in the vineyards to encourage soil fertility." "Cow horns are buried throughout the vineyard."

Biodynamic winegrowers do not bury cow horns “filled with fermented cow manure…throughout the vineyard”. In this case, the reference is to the production of Biodynamic Preparation 500. To prepare BD 500, you place very fresh, raw organic cow manure in cow horns in the fall and bury them in a single pit in a specially selected site. There they ferment over the winter and the horns are dug up in the spring. The finished BD 500 is mixed with water and applied to your soils. It assists with the formation of humus, increases available phosphorous, soil mycorrhiza and the water and nutrient holding capacity of the soil. The goal of BP 500 is to regenerate the natural microbiome and raise the quality of your soils.

“Naturally occurring cycles like moon phases dictate when to harvest ”

Moon phases do not “dictate” when we harvest at Troon Vineyard. That the phases of the moon have an impact on the natural rhythms of agriculture is a time-tested (and scientifically proven) reality. Following the ascending and descending cycles of the moon is something any natural farmer tries to do. However, the operative word here is “tries”. It’s one thing to follow these cycles in your home garden, but it’s another thing on a commercial farm. We certainly try to follow the lunar cycles, but often the realities of Mother Nature means you have to move forward. When you have to prune fifty acres of vines by a specific date, and you can’t prune when it’s raining (due to disease pressure), you can only do your best to hit the right days. When the fruit is ready to harvest, but it’s not a fruit day, but it’s going to rain three inches tomorrow your choice is easy - you pick. Any positive attributes you gain by picking on a certain day will be more than negated by the next day’s rain. We try to follow these lunar cycles whenever possible as we are seeking every advantage, no matter how small, to add that extra bit of nuance and life to our wines. The biodynamic calendar identifies ideal days for certain types of vineyard work. You try to prune on fruit days and cultivate on root days. As our goal is exceptional fruit quality, doing work on certain days is a way to fine-tune the quality of our fruit. However, we do not seek viticultural management from the man-in-the-moon, we just want a little advice, and will make our decisions based on what experience, common sense and science have taught us.

”Special concoctions of herbs, minerals, and manure may also be planted in the soil to aid fertilization.”

“Herbs, minerals and manure” are not planted in the vineyard soil to help fertilization. A range of plants (BP 502 to 507 - yarrow, chamomile, stinging nettle, oak bark, dandelion, valerian) are fermented then added to compost piles to aid in developing the right bacterial and fungal balance in the finished compost, which will then be applied to the vineyard - back to the microbiome again. It is important to note that while compost contains some beneficial minerals, it is not fertilizer. The point of biodynamic compost is to build the humus and microbiome of your soil. A healthy plant in healthy soil does not require additional chemical fertilization. This is the cornerstone of biodynamic practice. When we need to fertilize due to soils depleted by years of conventional agriculture or when growing a perennial crop like grapes, we add natural fertilizers like fish emulsion (think SNL’s Bass-O-Matic) and kelp. No biodynamic farmer would add raw manure to their field without fully composting it first. Besides the obvious health concerns, raw manure cannot do the job of properly made compost. Our compost is made from organic cow manure from our next door neighbor Noble Dairy, organic hay and our own pomace (grape skins and stems after pressing during harvest), which is then carefully composted for the better part of a year before being applied to our vineyard.

"there’s even a calendar for optimal wine-tasting days”

Then there is the currently fashionable calendar for “optimal wine-tasting days” - there’s even an app for that. However, the flower, leaf, root and fruit day thing is not part of Rudolf Steiner’s original agricultural lectures and was only added to the biodynamic culture in the 1950s by Maria Thun in Germany. Her concepts were built on research in her garden and, while her results have never been supported by independent research, there is strong anecdotal evidence that something is indeed at work here when it comes to the inner workings of plants. The base of these theories is that the moon’s gravity has an influence on the liquid in plants and soils much the same as it does on tides. A reasonable assumption. To me it is a stretch, at best, to apply this same theory to a glass of wine on your kitchen table. However, those same influences could affect the tasters themselves. Whatever the case, these concepts are a not a required part of Demeter Biodynamic certification, which is a statement in itself. Optimal wine-tasting days may have sprung from biodynamic ideas, but they are not part of biodynamic practice. However, it can be a useful excuse in a pinch if a customer is less than happy with your wine.

Biodynamics is a work-in-progress. When Rudolf Steiner gave his lectures in the early 1920s in Germany, he was living in a world in chaos, the same chaos that gave birth to the Nazis. World War I had just devastated Europe and, on the farm, the introduction of chemical, industrial agriculture terrified many people. It is in this climate that Steiner gave his agricultural lectures at the request of a group of concerned farmers. What is called biodynamics today was only outlined by Steiner himself in his lectures, and he died just a few years after giving them. Many of the practices considered essential practices of biodynamics today were layered on by those that came after him. While Steiner gave voice to the fears of that era, what we call biodynamics today is more the work of a movement than one person.

That work continues today and the growing number of winegrowers adopting biodynamics is having a tremendous impact on the movement’s future. Each year more is learned about biodynamics, and now modern agricultural science is moving towards the fundamental farming practices that define biodynamics - that the key to a healthy plant is healthy soils. Everything today is about the microbiome - in our guts and our soils. Biodynamic farmers have been giving their soils probiotics for decades. Science is just now catching up to us.

From what I have been able to read and understand (not always the same thing when reading Steiner) in Steiner’s books, he saw his concepts as only a beginning of an individual’s quest for spiritual and intellectual growth. While he did not approve of alcohol, I still think he would approve as winegrowers the world over push the pursuit of biodynamics forward. Today winegrowers are at at the forefront of connecting science and biodynamics. The winegrowing community is creating what I call practical biodynamics. Voodoo vintners we are not.

Who is to say what biodynamics will mean fifty years in the future? The only sure thing is that it will be as different from today’s practices as we are from the first practitioners in the 1920s. It will always be a work-in-progress as we will never understand everything. Mother Nature will always keep some secrets to herself.

Now that I think about it, it’s no wonder that writers struggle with understanding the practice of biodynamics, so do we. Agricultural knowledge is always evolving. There is much we don't know and much we will never know. Bringing science and biodynamics together will be the next chapter.

That’s a story worth telling well.

Some recommended reading on biodynamic winegrowing

Biodynamic Wine by Monty Waldin - certainly the most complete book available on the topic

Voodoo Vintners (in spite of the title) by Katherine Cole

Investing in a Stranger’s Future

Agriculture is cyclical. Season flows into season. Vines flower then a hundred or so days later you harvest their fruit. Animals and farmers live their life cycles together on land that sustains them both. Nature wraps us in the cycle of life.

In January we begin to think of pruning and worrying about frost. What happened last vintage is behind us and only the potential of the next fills your minds. After all, the wines in the cellar are committed to their course and it is only our role to shepherd them home. That vintage is over.

There are few things other than agriculture where you so firmly press the reset button on the first of January. Of course, we build on the experience bestowed upon us by Mother Nature each year, but that’s all nuance compared to the cycles of Nature, which make all the most important choices.

We are facing a lot of new hurdles at Troon Vineyard as we begin a ranch-wide replant designed both to correct the viticultural sins of the past and to proactively move forward by selecting better varieties and then planting them in better sites. To move forward you must be willing to break ties to the past. At Troon we’ve decided to race towards the future.

New plantings will be decidedly focused on the varieties made famous by the Rhône Valley, Languedoc and Provence. These vines have proven their proclivity for our Kubli Bench terroir. Now it’s our turn to take what we’ve learned and focus on creating some truly special wines - some of which may be a decade or more away.

To some it may seem odd to embark on a voyage knowing you will not arrive at the destination, but that is farming and winegrowing. There is never any end to the cycle of seasons and you are only part of a chain that passes the baton ever-forward in a never-ending relay race. Nothing fires my passion more than knowing that I can make a perfect baton pass to the next generation. If they can make great wines from the vines we plant, I will have done more than my job. That is my goal.

For the time remaining to me, I will become a small part of the life of this vineyard and hope that I am still around to taste at least the potential of the vines we plant over the next years. We each get our vintages and it is our responsibility to enjoy every one and to hope that our work today will be rewarded with wines we will never taste made by people we never knew. They may not know us, but the vines we plant today will speak for us in the wines they make.

Every glass of wine we drink from an old vineyard carries the voices of those that planted and worked it over the decades. Listen to us, we deserve your attention.

Harvest 2018 Photo Album - Troon Vineyard in Oregon's Applegate Valley

Mother Nature was very kind to us in 2018. Rain and cool weather are things you expect during harvest in Oregon, but not this year! All during harvest we were given warm, dry weather under beautiful blue skies. This perfect weather meant we could harvest each variety at the ideal moment. There was no pressure from the weather so our pace was almost leisurely compared to a normal vintage. It was a harvest to remember as will the wines!

Picking tinta roriz, this is our last vintage of this variety as these vines will be pulled and replanted next year.

Picking starts at dawn with the vines still in the shade of the Siskiyou Mountains, which are already brightly illuminated.

Some picure-perfect vermentino.

Banele and Jesus picking malbec as dawn breaks.

The Applegate Valley during harvest.

In a biodynamic vineyard, the leaves are fully turned color and falling off when it is time to pick the fruit. This is the natural cycle of a vine.

Vineyard manager Adan Cortes bundled up against the morning cold as he harvests vermentino.

Associate winemaker and biodynamic team leader Nate Wall fills cow horns to make biodynamic preparation 500. They will buried until next spring. Making BD 500 is something you do during harvest in the fall.

Banele, our harvest intern from South Africa, places the filled cow horns in pit to be buried until next spring. The BD 500 they will produce will be sprayed on our vineyards.

Grape pomace, fresh from the press, is added to our compost pile. All the leftovers from harvest are added to our biodynamic compost piles and returned to the vineyard.

Life Feels Good

It’s just after dawn, and we’re spreading fresh cow manure with pitchforks. Our biodynamic consultant, Andrew Beedy, looks at me and jokes, “see why people use chemical fertilizers?”

Andrew is, of course, correct. It would be so much easier to buy drums of fertilizers and spray away. However, as I stand on this pile of cow dung, I am firmly convinced we’ll get the last laugh.

At Troon Vineyard when we talk about compost, we’re not talking about a few buckets of manure to fill some cow horns to make BP 500. When it comes to composting, we’re talking some serious shit as we need to generate over 200 tons of finished biodynamic compost every year.

The raw materials are simple: fresh organic cow manure, organic hay and the organic/biodynamic pomace from our own fruit. Combine these basic ingredients and let nature take its course and you end up with a magical substance. Not that there’s any magic involved as bacteria do the lions share of the work. At a biodynamic winery, you are surrounded by ferments. Right now we are fermenting wine, compost and some buried cow horns to produce BP 500. Some of the smallest things in nature are doing all the heavy lifting at Troon Vineyard.

The transformation is quite amazing. First, the manure arrives from the organic dairy next store. Dump truck after dump truck arrives along with the flies that crave their cargo. Then our crew goes to work. Starting with a layer of hay, followed by a layer of manure, followed by another layer of hay and so on. Most of the work is by hand as when the front loader dumps a bucket of manure you spread it out with shovels and pitchforks. The bales of hay are broken up and spread by hand. During the harvest season, layers of pomace are alternated with the hay and manure. We build the piles into windrows about 130 feet long and five feet high. Then come the biodynamic preparations 502 yarrow, 503 chamomile, 504 stinging nettle, 505 oak bark, 506 dandelion, and 507 valerian. The first five are applied to specific parts of the pile while the 507 is sprayed onto the entire pile. Over the next six months, the pile will be turned several times, which means all the preparations are well mixed into the pile by the time composting is finished. Just a few weeks after the manure is delivered the flies that come with it disappear as the pile quickly transforms from something that draws flies into something that attracts earthworms. Now we’re talking.

While much is made of the very photogenic burying of the cow horns to make BD 500, and 500 is indeed essential and a foundation of biodynamics, you can’t avoid the fact that out of nine biodynamic preparations six are added to the compost pile. People may debate biodynamics, but no one who knows anything about agriculture questions the value of compost. However, biodynamic compost takes things to the next level. Study after study confirms that biodynamically treated compost is higher in every key nutritional value than standard compost. Every year we will be producing enough of this elixir to apply several tons per acre. Combined with our applications of BD 500 we expect to find dramatic improvements to the microbiome of our vineyard, which will lead directly to improvements in our wines. There is nothing you can do to your vineyard that is more important than this type of composting.

After six months, the raw manure, hay, and pomace transform. What started as smelly fly food becomes rich, dark humus. The smell and flies slowly disappear and in the end you end up with something that looks and smells more-or-less like high-end, organic potting soil - two hundred tons of potting soil.

Composting is such a great experience as you can readily see the results of your efforts. What goes in is very different from what comes out. There is a real sense of accomplishment, and investment in the future of your soils, vines, and wines.

Next spring we’ll be applying BD 500 and compost - both created on our farm. While we have farmed 100% biodynamically this year, we had to purchase the BD preparations and organic compost while we went through the long process of making our own. As excited as we were in our practice of biodynamics this year, applying our own preparations and compost will be a real milestone.

There’s life everywhere. In the compost, in the BD 500, in the vines, in the wines and in us. Life feels good.

Vineyard manager Adan Cortes, with Andrew Beedy’s son Levon along for the ride, sprays BD 507 Valerian onto a compost pile.

A New Culture at Troon (and poop jokes)

Assistant Winemaker Nate Wall fills horns.

It seems everyone either ridicules or worships the cow horns and the processes of biodynamics. Then there’s biodynamic cycles of the moon that are mistakenly confused with astrology - no, not related. You can’t blame the press for focusing on these aspects of biodynamics  as they make for great photos and headlines. However, as wine writer Monty Walden recently noted, “Biodynamics is not farming by the moon.”

Biodynamics is farming by the earth.

At Troon Vineyard we recently completed one of the milestones for any biodynamic farmer. We buried our first cow horns on the estate to produce our own biodynamic preparation 500.  The images of burying the cow horns may have become cliché, but for those of us who participated, it felt like a right-of-passage as we joined other biodynamic farmers around the world in what feels like a celebration to those involved. It is hard to imagine, but stuffing cow horns with fresh manure is a meaningful experience. After the horn’s ingredients ferment in our soils over the winter, we’ll take the newly created BD 500 and apply it to our vineyard soils to help build the natural microbiome that plants require to take their nutrition naturally from the soils. By letting the soil and the plants do the work we will end up with fruit that carries the energy and personality of our vineyard into our wines. Farming by the earth is the essence of terroir.

Biodynamics changes the soils, the vines, but equally importantly it changes the people who practice this discipline. Biodynamics is a structure and gives you a framework, which at the beginning you work within, but as you grow as a farmer you also go beyond.  While everyone loves to focus on cow horns and moon cycles, and these are important aspects of biodynamics, these famous elements of this discipline are not the biggest changes at an estate that transforms into biodynamic agriculture. Perhaps the biggest changes happen to the people who take up this mission. Biodynamics not only transforms your soils, but your culture as a winery.

A big part of that change is that farming biodynamically is fun. You feel empowered by what you are doing and each day is a new adventure. Even though it’s much harder work than conventional farming, the risks and the efforts reward you with not only better grapes, but a better you. Filling our horns was a group effort and laced with happy banter and camaraderie. Poop jokes were as abundant as the actual poop at this celebration. Everyone including the horns were full of it. Conventional farming makes sterile soils and wines. There is nothing sterile about the world of biodynamics.

We’ll be stuffing horns again next fall. If you don't mind dirty hands and some rather unsophisticated humor come join our celebration!

In biodynamic agriculture, we bury cow horns filled with fresh cow manure each fall. These ferment over the winter and next season will be applied to our soils to help build the microbiome​. of our vineyard. In this video, Banele (harvest intern from South Africa), Lindsay (harvest intern from Ireland) assistant winemaker Nate Wall and biodynamic consultant Andrew Beedy fill our horns at Troon Vineyard.

Vineyard Venom

When I first arrived at Troon Vineyard, the then vineyard manager reviewed the previous year’s vineyard applications. Other than the usual nastiness like Roundup, one product immediately grabbed my eye - Venom. I was not familiar with this product, but, with a name like Venom, I did not expect anything good. 

A trip to the manufacture’s website confirmed my worst fears. Venom proved just as nasty as it sounded, “This compound is toxic to honey bees. The persistence of residues and potential residual toxicity of dinotefuran in nectar and pollen suggest the possibility of chronic risk to honey bee larvae and the eventual instability of the hive.” for the complete manufacturer information sheet click here

That’s right, it kills honey bees. All of them.

There was no more Venom or anything like that used at Troon from then on. Today, now that we have converted to biodynamic agriculture, we use products with much gentler names and impacts on the environment. For example, now we use products with names like Regalia, an organically certified biofungicide that works by strengthening the plants own defenses rather than poisoning anything and everything whether good or bad. It does not seem to be a coincidence that conventional chemical agricultural products often have scary names as, indeed, they are dangerous to everything - people as well as bees.

Products like Regalia not only sound less threatening but are less dangerous in the long-term as conventional chemicals tend to create fungicide-resistant strains that then require even more powerful chemical applications to combat them. Organic products like Regalia are based on bacteria that are already in the environment, which trigger the plant's natural defense system. In other words, we are only encouraging the plant to does what it does naturally

“When treated with Regalia, a plant’s natural defense systems are activated to protect against attacking diseases. Research shows that plants treated with Regalia produce and accumulate elevated levels of specialized proteins and other compounds known to inhibit fungal and bacterial diseases. Regalia induces a plant to produce phytoalexins, cell strengtheners, antioxidants, phenolics and PR proteins, which are all known inhibitors of plant pathogens. Regalia provides synergistic properties between a plant’s natural ability to protect itself and the effectiveness of antifungal and antibacterial protection.“ Marrone Bio-Innovations

Humans consider themselves smarter than plants, but we’re not. When it comes to producing grapes, the vine understands more about producing beautiful ripe grapes than we’ll ever know. It is arrogant on our part to believe we can do better. That arrogance has led to the use of chemicals that destroy the vines natural ability to feed and defend itself and to weaker plants addicted to fertilizers and chemicals. A weak plant does not produce the kinds of grapes that produce great wines. The single most important thing for quality wine is a strong, healthy grapevine. Our job as winegrowers is to help the vine do its work, not to do its work for it. When it comes to growing grapes, we are the apprentice and the vine is the master craftsman. This is a good thing to remember in this era of cult wines and winemakers. It is the vine and the soil that create memorable wines, not people. People are quite capable of producing commercially successful beverage wine products, but only vines and vineyards can give you sublime, individual wines. In a well-farmed vineyard with healthy vines and good soils, the winemaker's role is more as a shepherd than artist or technician. If you are not humbled by nature you are not connected to it, don’t understand it and can’t transform that power into wines that are anything other than industrial.

Biodynamics finally clicks in your brain when you realize as a farmer you are not a general in charge of a battlefield, but just another cog in the gear that makes nature work. Arrogance and chemical interventions have led to disaster. Farmers who realize their place in nature produce better and healthier foods and wines. This is a mindset that can be achieved by farmers large and small. 

Now at Troon, instead of destroying honey bees we are building three aviaries with accompanying pollinator habitats. The bees deserve this respect as we are just two of the myriad of intertwined pieces that make a farm a whole. We owe them something for the past sins of our predecessors. It will be an honor to welcome them back home.

The Smell of Biodynamics

I remember the smells well and they always take me back to my childhood. That warm, earthy pungent smell can only come from one thing. I grew up in a small rural town in northern Illinois on the Wisconsin border . My grandfather and grandmother, Chester and Goldie Camp, were small dairy farmers, a type of farmer that rarely exists anymore. They were organic farmers, but did not know it.

My grandparents, Chester and Goldie Camp

I stayed with them often as a child, rising with my grandfather before dawn for the morning milking. I can remember looking up at him while he shaved as he lathered up with a brush swirled on a bar in a cup - yes, he shaved before milking. Then out to the barn for what, in those days, was the very hard physical job of milking. You carried the pails of milk to the tank one-by-one. I would wander among the cows while the men worked - avoiding their back-ends and hoofs due to the stern admonitions of my grandfather. The rich, warm aromas of the animals, the feed and, of course, the manure filled the barn while the twang of country music pushed by 50,000 watts from WJJD in Chicago tinnily played from an old and very dirty radio. After the morning’s work, my grandmother would have a huge country breakfast waiting with, of course, a glass of fresh milk, cream and all, straight from the milk tank. 

These memories came flowing back to me as Troon’s vineyard foreman, Adan Cortes, dumped the first load of cow manure onto our new biodynamic compost pile. Soon more will follow. We are lucky to have the Noble Family Organic Dairy as a next-door neighbor - an unlimited supply of organic manure from the thousands of happy, healthy cows they milk three times a day. 

Compost is the cornerstone of a biodynamic program. While organic regulations may be focused on what you can’t use, the Demeter Biodynamic Certification follows all the USDA Organic rules, but the discipline of biodynamics takes things further with the biodynamic preparations and the concept of the whole farm. Biodynamic compost is the main vehicle that brings health to your soils and therefor your vines. Strong vines can fight off threats while weak vines require chemicals to survive. Of the nine biodynamic preparations, only three are applied to directly to the vineyard - 500, 501, 508 - while the other six - 502 to 507 - are applied to the compost piles. We began our biodynamic compost program in earnest last week starting with manure from our neighbor organic farmer, Noble Dairy. The Noble family has been farming organically since 2004. We layered this rich manure with organic hay from another neighbor and the remains from last harvest’s grape pressings to create a pile about 150 feet long and five feet high. Then our vineyard foreman Adan Cortes applied the biodynamic preparations to the new pile. It was an exciting and emotional experience for all of us at Troon. Next week we are building a second pile and this fall will be creating four more based on our grape pomace from this year’s harvest. From now on nature’s circle will be unbroken with each vintage producing the compost to feed our vineyard soils for another year.

My grandparents were organic farmers and didn’t even know it. My grandmother prepared and canned organic vegetables from her organic garden. On Sundays, they ate free-range, organic chicken - that my grandfather killed the day before. Note my grandfather could only kill the chickens my grandmother had not named. They fed their dairy cattle organic hay in the winter and they grazed on organic grass in the summer. They were either blissfully unaware of the latest chemicals or could not afford them, or both. Michael Pollan wrote in his excellent book, In Defense of Food, don’t eat anything that your grandparents would not recognize as food. Certainly, good advice in my case.

When you grow grapes for wine you are growing food and Pollan’s recommendation can easily be rewritten to don’t drink wine that your grandparents would not recognize as wine - not that my grandparents ever had a sip of wine as far as I know. Pabst was my grandfather’s drink of choice.

The direct connection of memories of my grandparents to our building our first compost pile was a warm, emotional experience for me. Agriculture is a seasonal and circular experience, if you are not emotionally connected to the past you will always struggle. Emotions and good feelings very much describe the process of converting to biodynamics. You feel good about what you are doing. While we have practiced sustainable agriculture for years, this is different and you can feel it.

It feels right. Chester and Goldie would approve.

The Soul of Soil

It’s the smell. Your nose tells you as much as your eyes. Rich and complex - almost sweet, this is a good spot. You move a few yards and your nose tells you another story - musty and sour. Not a good spot. It seems dirt, like wine, has a bouquet. 

May at Troon Vineyard was all about dirt.  Moving it, working it, digging it, smelling it and, most of all, marveling at it. Soil is the foundation of everything you do on a farm. It is often said you can make a mediocre wine from a great vineyard, but you can’t make a great wine from a mediocre vineyard. What makes a vineyard great is its soil combined with climate or, as the French call it, terroir. You can’t make bad soil magically good, but you can destroy great soil with commercial, industrial agriculture. We know we have great soils on Oregon’s Kubli Bench due to the already excellent wines we have produced, but the fact-of-the-matter is that these fine soils have been abused by less than enlightened farming practices in the past. I know that if we can bring our soils back to life we can take our already very good wines to even higher levels of quality, in fact, to true greatness.  I believe the way to achieve this goal is through the discipline of biodynamics. With soil, you have to put back as least as much as you take out.

We took two major steps forward for our soils and vines this month. The first, which has its own wonderful aromatics, was the construction of our compost pad for production of biodynamic compost. About an acre in size, this pad will eventually hold four compost piles. The first will be the fresh manure and the last will be compost ready for application to our vineyards. The first loads of organic manure were delivered by our neighbors at the Noble Dairy and soon we will be applying the biodynamic preparations (502 to 507) to this pile as we prepare it for application to our vineyard this fall. This is also the area where we will bury the cow horns to prepare our own biodynamic preparation 500 this fall for application next spring. This is a very exciting process for us as we not only rejuvenate our soils, but ourselves. 

Our other important step forward with our soils this month was an intensive study of our vineyard by Dr. Paul Anamosa and his Vineyard Soils Technologies team. Using an electro-magnetic study of our vineyard done earlier this year, Dr. Anamosa selected seventy sites where we dug soil pits five feet deep. We spent a fascinating three days with Dr. Nick Madden and Matt Bazzano of Vineyard Soil Technologies and our biodynamic consultant Andrew Beedy as they conducted an exhaustive study analyzing every aspect of the soil in each pit. Each evening soil samples were whisked off to the lab in nightly FedEx shipments. The data we will receive from this study will guide us as we move forward not only in our farming, but in what vine varieties we select and how and where we plant them.

One thing you learn very quickly as you dig hole after hole is that the earth is hiding surprises. You think you can tell good ground by just looking, but that is not always the case. In one spot you find unseen underground water and in another, which you had dismissed, you find gorgeous, sweet smelling gravelly soils.  Well-drained sites smell alive and fresh, while poorly drained soils have the musty stink of anaerobic bacteria at work - almost like the aroma of a corked wine.  A wine’s bouquet truly comes from the ground up. 

Our hole digging days started at 7 a.m. and ended at 7 p.m. in Grants Pass brewpubs. It seems even after twelve hours we could not get enough of talking dirt. Local beer and pizza is a fine ending to a day spent touching the Earth and connecting to people like Andrew, Nick and Matt who have devoted their lives to finding the soul of soil.

At Troon, we are combining the natural, homeopathic methods of biodynamics with state of the art science with only one goal in mind - to make world-class wines in Oregon’s Applegate Valley.  To achieve this goal we have to not only search our souls, but the soul of our soils. 

Dr. Nick Madden, Dr. Paul Anamosa and our biodynamic consultant Andrew Beedy digging a soil pit in our block of zinfandel planted in 1987

Soil studies in our 1972 heritage block

Nick and Matt in our heritage 1972 vineyard block.

Analyzing soil color

Dr. Nick Madden taking soil samples

In a soil pit

Dr. Nick Madden taking soil samples

Turn, Turn, Turn

For everything, there is a season. There is a flow to the year that is defined by what is being harvested. Moments defined by what we eat and drink. As these seasonal treats start arriving at the farmers market, they mark your place in the year. Peas and asparagus in spring, summer brings peaches and tomatoes, fall brings squash and, for those of us who make wine, grapes. Each of them gives you a sense of time and place. 

The wines I drink dance across the calendar along with the foods I find at the market. Cold weather brings stews, risotto, pasta, root vegetables and bolder wines - Barolo, St. Joseph, Bandol, and Tannat appear on my table. The arrival of summer brings vegetables and simple grills into staring roles and white wines - vermentino, roussanne, Sancerre, Muscadet, Soave along with wines of wildly varying shades of pink often become my wines of choice. For reds, pinot noir, Valpolicella, grenache and, most of all, Beaujolais  - all wines that love a light chill - bring perfect pleasure. 

Things that grow react to the season and wine is no exception. Obviously, drinking a Barolo on a hot day in August is not the same sin as insisting on buying tomatoes in January. Yet, I think the full pleasures of a Barolo are more likely to show themselves with Osso Bucco on a crisp fall evening than with a caprese on a hot summer afternoon.

Wine is food, and it is more enjoyable when served in the same way.  We are drawn to certain foods at different times of the year and should apply that same common sense to wines.

I’m always mystified when people tell me they don’t like white wine or they only like big reds - the wine world’s equivalent of picky eaters. To me wine is wine, and the color is decided by the food, the season and, of course, my mood. There is no arguing with taste, but I’ll argue those picky eaters and drinkers aren’t tasting at all. They’ve already made up their minds.

The more you pay attention to what you taste the more diversity of experience you crave. That terrifying question I’ve been asked many times, “If you could only drink one wine for the rest...” - is more nightmare than fantasy. The other question I’m often asked is, “what’s your favorite wine you make” or, perhaps even worse, “what’s the best wine you make” leave me speechless. They are questions without an answer. 

Each wine we make at Troon has its moment, its meal, its season. What’s my favorite wine? The one in my glass. 

Becoming One with Wine

The world feels somehow different today at Troon Vineyard. I guess you can’t reinvent a vineyard without reinventing yourself. Reinventing and reinvigorating people and a vineyard at the same time is about the simplest way I can explain our transition to biodynamic farming. Everything just feels more alive.

Over the last week what was all planning, items on a Trello board, started to become real. New equipment, new ways of thinking and a new spirit all converged at Troon Vineyard this week. The first step was just a simple piece of string

Twine ties in a block of our vermentino

After years of plastic ties in the vineyard, many of a particularly noxious green color, we have replaced them with hand-knotted pieces of twine. The contrast between the bilious green of the old ties and the warm, earth tones of the twine ties running down the rows tying the canes to the wires could not be more obvious or meaningful. A simple change that tells of significant changes to come, we are becoming entwined in nature.

A somewhat physically more prominent change was the arrival of our Clemens radius weeder or “weed knife”.  While a big financial investment, an efficient tool to control weeds is necessary if you are going to forgo chemicals like the seemingly ever-present Roundup. Many may debate about the evils of glyphosate, and all too many sustainable certifications allow it, but common sense tells us that chemicals like these are just not part of nature’s plan.  It’s hard to describe how well the Clemens does its job as it fluidly dances the blade around each vine almost in slow motion - we actually it is in slow motion as the tractor can only go two and a half miles an hour while doing this work.

Other new mechanical arrivals include the Clemens multi-clean undervine brush, which, as the name implies, literally whisks away suckers and weeds around the base of the vine. Then there is a tank-like Domries disc and a Domries tri-till cultivator. We now have the tools to do the job right.

Creating a vortex while stirring BD 500

Then there was the really good shit, literally, which arrived this week. Now living in Southern Oregon, that phrase tends to refer to other local agricultural products, in our case, it was actually shit. This was the famed BD 500, the cow manure aged in buried cow horns. For this first application we had to purchase some finished BD 500, but by next spring we’ll have buried and fermented our own. The finished preparation does not remind of the original state or aromatics of the raw materials as it looks and smells more like very rich potting soil. To prepare 500 for application requires stirring it a very particular way. Troon winemaker Steve Hall selected one of our oldest barrels (for the history of place it had experienced) then after adding the 500 to around forty gallons of water we begin the stirring process. Steve and I alternated during the hour long process. First you stir in one direction until you build a deep vortex then suddenly reverse direction going violently from order to disorder. You repeat this process over-and-over for the full hour. This was a uniquely satisfying  experience as you bond with the preparation that will become one with your soil. A very different experience than wearing haz-mat gear demanded by standard vineyard applications. Once prepared we poured the BD 500 into the sprayer and as the week came to a close our entire property had received this application. 

Just knowing that the first biodynamic preparation is in our soils gives me both a sense of peace and accomplishment. We are on an entirely new voyage with a new mission. Just as the vines are reborn each spring, this spring Troon Vineyard is reborn along with them. Soon the buds will break into a whole new world of winegrowing. 

Biodynamics will reinvigorate our soils and our vines, but it is also reinvigorating us. It is those combined energies that will be expressed in our wines. Wines full of energy are exciting wines and we could not be more excited about making them. Our desire to make special wines from what we know is a vineyard, a terroir, with exceptional potential is what started us on this voyage to begin with. 

We are at the starting line of a long struggle to achieve our goals. Now that we have taken our first steps we feel like a sprinter whose energy has just been released by the starting gun. 

The vines, the soil, the place, the wines and the people are all becoming one.

Alberto spraying BD 500 in a block of zinfandel