2021 was a difficult time to grow grapes in British Columbia. The extremely hot summer, with late June temperatures as high as 47 C, meant the BC Harvest was started and completed several weeks earlier than normal.
Many growers this year suffered from low yields, or none at all with some varietals! Although, yields are down again the fruit quality is high with very ripe, small berries, exploding with flavour.
Long periods of smoke were experienced in the Thompson and Okanagan Valleys but fortunately, no smoke was detected in the wines even as they finish their fermentations. Many thanks to the winemakers and wineries that provided input for the first harvest article:
- Tantalus Vineyards
- Castoro de Oro Winery
- Stoneboat Vineyards and Valley Commons
- Lightning Rock Winery
- Intrigue Wines
- Four Shadows Vineyard & Winery
- TIME Family Wines
- Rocky Creek Winery
- Averill Creek Vineyard
- Monte Creek Winery
- Chaberton Estate Winery
- Waterside Vineyard & Winery
Here are the twelve winemakers’ detailed comments grouped by location.
Kelowna
David Paterson | Tantalus Vineyards
2021 was one of the most challenging growing seasons we have ever gone through. Viticulturists had their work cut out. With heat domes affecting berry and cluster sizing and a very long period of smoke in the valley, it felt like a war against the elements at times. The resulting crop was very small and very concentrated. The whites and roses are stunning, and we are very optimistic about Pinot Noir and Syrah this year. It is a little early in the game to call out just how good these wines will be, but if flavour concentration is anything to go by we should be in for another excellent Vintage.
Here is the link to order Tantalus Vineyard wines.
Oliver
Stella and Bruno Kelle | Castoro de Oro Winery
The 2021 harvest at Castoro de Oro Estate Winery is our sixteenth and it was a wonderful growing season for us with some of our earliest picks ever. The grapes are clean and have lovely intense flavours, with balanced acidity and ripeness, so we are looking forward to the 2021 vintage wines release. While there were several fires on the other side of the valley and near both towns, being the midpoint between the two towns and on the Golden Mile we didn’t have as much smoke. A few days were very smoky overall but we didn’t have a smoky year.
This harvest has been challenging in other ways though, primarily that our full-time staff member has been on compassionate leave since July. Without Bruno’s “right-hand man” helping in the vineyard and on crush we’ve had little time to take pictures this year.
Our tonnage is down from previous years but that is mostly to do with our change in plantings!
In 2020 we pulled out some of our old vines, planted in 1980 and 1981, yes – we felt bad – yikes!! We decided that we could source whites from other Okanagan sites less suited to red wine grape growing than ours. This is why we pulled all of our Gewurztraminer and some of our Pinot Blanc to plant more Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir. We were extremely pleased that over 99.5% of the new vines took and grew extremely well in 2020 and also in 2021. The picture below is from August 22, 2021, of some of our new grapevines planted in 2020.
Again in 2021, we pulled out more of our old vine plantings, more Pinot Blanc and some Vidal. We planted Syrah and Merlot and they have made a good start as well. We look forward to being able to produce more of our Pinot Noir, Merlot and Crimson Rhapsody Blend as these newer plantings come into production.
For more information on Castoro de Oro wines. Also see – Castoro de Oro Winery for wines in a CAN for more information on the winery.
Bill Adams | Stoneboat Vineyards & Valley Commons
We started our Harvest on September 7th and were able to bring in the last of our grapes on October 21st. The harvest months were warm and dry, allowing us to pick when the grapes were ready and not have to be forced to pick early due to long periods of rain or frost. A historical heat wave during the summer months caused us some problems in the vineyard, with low yields on some varieties. Brix levels increased quickly early on, and it was difficult to find a balance between acid and pH when choosing our picking times.
This years’ red wines look fantastic, fully ripe but with higher alcohols. Whites came in almost two weeks earlier than an average year but maintained freshness and acid levels. So far we have not detected any smoke taint issues and feel overall, 2021 could turn into a great vintage for us.
Making wines for both Stoneboat Vineyards and Valley Commons is challenging. We worked with new growers, increased our production, and made wine at two separate locations. Jugging tank space is always tricky, as once harvest started, the grapes kept rolling in almost every day. We are excited about the new winery at the District Wine Village for Valley Commons and making some great wines there. The 2021 whites are looking very promising and can’t wait until the release of the 2021 reds shortly.
We are especially excited to launch our Valley Commons Harvest Table Red in Spring/Summer 2022. This is an amazing red blend that has currently been barrel ageing for 22 months, 70% French Oak and 30% American Oak. As for Stoneboat Vineyards, we just released our Club Red wine which is a divine and juicy Pinotage Viognier and we will be releasing our Club White in Spring 2022 (but it’s still a surprise so stay tuned!).
Here is the link to purchase Stoneboat Vineyard wines and more information on Valley Commons – Valley Commons in the District Wine Village
Summerland
Jordan Kubek | Lightning Rock Winery
The 2021 growing season was hot, hot, hot and as a result, we had a very early harvest, starting August 30th with Chardonnay for our Blanc de Blanc. We finished harvesting everything by hand with a stellar team, by September 23rd with our final Pinot Noir pick from Canyonview Vineyard. We will be all pressed off reds by Halloween, something we are usually still doing well into November.
The fruit looked great, with nice acidity balancing higher sugars. Our ambient ferments were all happily ticking away and are now mostly all finished and snoozing. We made a couple of new wines this year, including a Sauvignon Blanc Pét-Nat! Our Rosé Pét-Nat 2021 is currently getting ready for a mid-November release.
Here is the link to purchase Lightning Rock Wine and more information on the winery – Lightning Rock Winery – Sparkling Wines and More
Lake Country
Roger Wong | Intrigue Wines
We expected 2021 to be a breeze after 2020 but Mother Nature still had a few tricks left up her sleeve.
The exceptionally dry Spring got us off to an early start. Our wine shop and cellar team once again had our backs until Federico and Raul returned from Mexico. With such a warm Spring we had all the vines pruned and tied just in time for bud break. It was close.
We had a very compressed growing season once the heat dome settled over us. We would normally remove leaves around the fruit in June but decided to leaf thin only enough to provide good ventilation for the fruit. As the smoke from the wildfires settled arrived in July we again resisted removing leaves. We hoped was that the leaves would provide a canopy to protect the fruit from soot and ash. Like everything else this year, veraison arrived early as well. Our Pinot Gris started veraison on July 29 at the Davis vineyard.
September saw a new flurry of activity as we needed to catch up on the leaf thinning and then started picking. Once we had the fruit in the tanks and fermenting we realized that all of our mitigation techniques did make a difference. We haven’t detected smoke in any of our wines even as they finish their fermentations.
Next, Cheryl, Dan and Victoria will get busy preparing the wines for bottling. Roger and Les will line up all the packaging materials and we will start bottling the 2021 wines in January!
Here is the link to purchase Intrigue Wines and more information on the winery – Intrigue Wines 2020 Releases.
Naramata / Penticton
Wilbert Borren|Four Shadows Vineyard & Winery
As this year’s harvest and crush draw to a close, we are reflecting on another unique year for our estate vineyard at the southern end of the Naramata Bench. We found the first signs of bud break on April 28th, about a week ahead of last year, followed by flowering in early June. Thankfully flowering was nearly complete with most berries set before the first heatwave arrived in late June, as we experienced up to 46-degree temperatures in our vineyard. Throughout the following periods of sustained heat, drought and smoke, our plants incredibly maintained their health with very little disease pressure throughout the entire season.
Fortunately, the worst of the smoke exposure occurred before veraison, so we believe very little uptake by the grapes occurred. To cope with the heat, the plants retained more water in their roots/trunks than usual, resulting in a more manageable canopy as well as smaller berries which ultimately resulted in lower yields this year.
The low yield, especially in our upper block of Riesling, allowed the crop to ripen quickly and we saw very high Brix while grapes retained high acid levels. While yields were down, we found the amazing quality and intensely concentrated wines coming from the smaller berries. Harvest was complete on September 30th, several weeks earlier than average, with the assistance of our harvest crew of friends, family, neighbours and casual labourers. We’re now wrapping up fermentation in the cellar, getting reds into barrels and looking forward to a little extra time with family this autumn.
Here is the link to purchase Four Shadows wines and more information on the winery – Four Shadows Releases Three Rieslings
Lynzee Schatz |TIME Family of Wines
2021 Harvest seems almost like a blur when I think back on it now and it’s only mid-October as I write. Grapes came in as fast as we could process them. The Okanagan experienced a heatwave early in the summer which I believed pushed the sugar ripeness of the berries along further than seasonally normal. Harvest is always a fine-tuned dance we have with the growers, some years more of a waltz, this year more of a mambo.
Yields were low, quite low, 30-50% in some vineyards. Grapes for sparkling wine came off the vines at perfect sugar ripeness with roaring acids. Whites flew in next and then we had our first pick of red, Merlot, on Sept 28 which was about 3 weeks ahead of previous years. Everything was all picked by Oct 15th, 6 weeks from beginning to end. Besides almost every single piece of equipment we use for processing grapes breaking down, things went smoothly. Thank you to CellarTek for saving us many times!
While the ferments finish up and each new wine for 2021 starts to show itself I am thankful for the opportunity to make wines in the beautiful and one of a kind Okanagan Valley.
Here is the link to purchase TIME Family of Wines
Vancouver Island
Mark Holford | Rocky Creek Winery
2021 started slowly, with a relatively cool spring. A couple of warm periods resulted in a fairly normal bud break. June was up and down, with hot and cold spells. Unfortunately, a cool spell during flowering limited the crop set, so our crop load was light. Then the heatwave hit in July, breaking multiple records and accelerating fruit development. August continued the hot dry weather, and as dry farmers (we never irrigate) our grapes didn’t fill out, and we finished the summer with very ripe, small berries, exploding with flavour.
Harvest started in late August and was wrapped up on October 3rd, two weeks earlier than our previous earliest harvest. Overall, our crop was about 50% of a normal year, but incredible fruit – ripe, high skin to juice ratio, tons of colour. So we will have limited quantities but the wines should be amazing.
The picture of our Pinot Gris right out of the press, and our Rosé. Both are incredibly dark after only 16 hours on the skins.
Here is the link to purchase Rocky Creek Wines.
Brent Rowland | Averill Creek Vineyard
2021 was a great vintage for us. The heatwave in June gave us “carbohydrates in the bank”, meaning the plants got a good head start to the season. It was a very dry summer, so yields on the vinifera grapes were down but the quality was up. Despite the heat, we were able to dance around the rain and leave the fruit hanging on the vine till mid-October.
We achieved full phenolic ripeness while maintaining freshness, perfume, tension and nuance. For us on Mt Prevost, the highest degree growing days on record did not translate into big opulent fruit. But rather a vintage that is shaping up to be somewhere between 2019 and 2020. I prefer vintages like 2021, as they showcase the potential of our Island wines.
Here is the link to purchase Averill Creek wines and for more winery information see Averill Creek for an Edgy Pinot Noir
Thompson Valley
Galen Barnhardt | Monte Creek Winery
2021 was marked by an abundance of early-season heat, with more moderate temperatures later in the summer and into the fall. Budbreak timing was average with most varieties budding out around the first week of May. The spring was the driest on record for the South Thompson region, with none of the late May or June rain that we normally get. Temperatures were moderate until the third week of June when most of British Columbia went through an unprecedented heatwave.
Kamloops and the South Thompson broke numerous temperature records, and the thermometer at the winery read 47 degrees for a few days during the last week of June. Unfortunately, these dry and hot conditions created extreme fire conditions, and the rest of the season until September was marked by smoke throughout the southern half of British Columbia. Even with the smoke cover reducing available sunlight, we had our earliest start to harvest ever on August 18th, as well as by far our earliest finish, with the last grapes being picked on October 7th. 10 years ago it was almost unheard of to even START harvest before October in B.C. We began harvest by picking Marquette and finished with Merlot.
Due to the dry early season conditions when cluster size is determined, as well as the extreme heat during berry formation, both clusters and berries were smaller than normal this year and yields were very low in the South Thompson, Similkameen, and Okanagan. As a hot season with small berries, expect concentrated and tannic reds, along with flavour intensity to the whites.
It was definitely a season with its challenges because of the smoke and the heatwaves, but are seeing good flavour concentration and are looking forward to bottling our first 2021 vintages wines in early 2022.
Here is the link to purchase Monte Creek wines and more information on the winery Monte Creek Winery Unveils New Look
Fraser Valley
Gary Zhygailo|Chaberton Estate Winery
The 2021 Vintage was one of the hottest and driest in the Fraser Valley, which brought a concentrated aroma to the wine. Despite a dry summer, we had a decent yield on our vineyard this year due to the natural water reserve in the soil. Our vineyard is quite old, so vines have a strong root system that allowed them to reach water deep underground. At the moment all juices are in the finishing stage of fermentation, and it is going to be another good vintage.
Here is the link to purchase Chaberton Wines and more information on the winery Chaberton the largest winery in the Fraser Valley.
Shuswap
Jennifer and Kevin Verschoor | Waterside Vineyard & Winery
After a challenging year, like one we’ve never seen before, harvest was, if nothing else, smooth. Heatwaves and fires definitely proved to be a damper on our white grapes, with yields much lower than previous years. But like a champ, our Marechal Foch held steady and championed through it all, yielding a healthy, plentiful crop at Waterside. It is with great gratitude that we ended our harvest with bins full of each crop, even if it was less than last year. Many growers this year suffered greatly with low yields, or none at all with some varietals, and we are well aware of how we faired in comparison.
The crush was fast and furious as always; pressing of reds was wet and chilly with all of October’s rain. We are happy to have the wines put to bed for the winter, ageing with grace and good intention. Time will be the teller of all things, as it always is, in the effects of smoke from fires, blocked sunshine’s sweetness and the winemaker’s gentle touch. Onward to next year, pruning season is just around the corner!
Here is the link to purchase Waterside Wines and more information on the winery – Waterside Vineyards & Winery for Great Value Whites