Not too much, and not too little.

Thanks to the rain during the past couple days it has become cooler, and so
we've gotten out into the Chardonnay vineyards - like here in the Gloria -
to carefully begin our work on the foliage.

We attach the overhanging shoots to the wire trellising and trim them ever
so slightly. This makes for better air circulation around the developing
clusters, without encouraging any danger of the grapes becoming sunburned.

In the white wine vineyards it is particularly important in the hot summer
months to shield the grapes from the strongest sunshine, while at the same
time guaranteeing good ventilation in the space around the clusters;
this guards against he development of fungal diseases.

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Now comes the Green Harvest!

One of our most labour-intensive tasks on the vineyard-calendar is the
'green harvest,' when we are thinning-out the crop.

Here the number of clusters on the vine is reduced-depending on the variety,
this can amount to half of what's hanging.
The process serves to intensify all organic materials and constituent
elements in the clusters remaining.
We find it particularly essential with the red wines, in order to achieve
optimum ripening of the grapes year after year.

The vine will normally develop two and even three clusters on each shoot.
The top cluster is always a couple days behind in its development, and so we
remove it.
Also, it would be receiving less sunshine, so the evolution of tannins and
development of colouring agents would be retarded.

The green harvest actually requires more effort than picking the grapes in
autumn does.
But then, this thinning-out makes the harvest to follow easier, since there
are not so many bunches left to pick and the grapes are more evenly ripened.

So we can often avoid having to make an overly rigorous selection in the
vineyards-
and ultimately, it's easier to get our hands on the clusters, since they all
will now be hanging in plain sight at the lower end of the leaf-canopy.

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And now it's time for pruning!

Here we will shorten this summer's shoots to a length that should keep them
from snapping off directly above the last pair of wires. With this, the
leaf-canopy can grow up to 50 centimetres beyond the top of the trellis, and
reach a totally canopy-height of 160 cm. This will ensure optimum ripening
of the Blaufränkisch clusters — the basis for producing wines with a
powerful and ripe framework of tannins, which promises great aging potential
as well as elegance.

Weingut Kollwentz
Burgenland
www.kollwentz.at