October 14, 2010: Sixteenth day of harvest at Château Palmer, a day dedicated to harvesting our 2 hectares of Petit Verdot.
Almost 90% of our parcels have now been harvested.  Only 6 hectares of Cabernet Sauvignon remain, scheduled to be picked early next week.


We are heading towards the longest harvest in the history of the Château. This harvest has been spread over 4 weeks, due to the extended flowering period this year. Overall, the weather was favorable during flowering.  But the 50 millimeters of rain that fell on June 15th and 16th disturbed flowering, resulting in a longer-than-average pollination, coulure (fallen flowers) and millerandage (uneven development).



We took these obstacles into consideration.
The heterogeneous flowering was felt while in the vineyard tasting the grapes, which ripened at different speeds.  With this in mind, our harvesters had a few days off, while we "waited" for the grapes to fully ripen... and we had to accept that harvest would be spread out over a larger period of time, despite the logistical problems that this represents.
 
Our first impressions from October 4th are slowly being confirmed.
This summer's clement conditions have brought about noticeable water stress on the vines, favoring the metabolism of phenolic compounds.  We have grapes with a high level of tannins but with a beautiful structure.  Now we will adapt our winemaking methods to this tannic potential by using a slow and moderate extraction process.
 
33 tanks are now filled with the 2010 harvest; 33 samples were tasted this morning.  The first Merlots harvested have now finished their alcoholic fermentation so this afternoon we will begin running off the wine, then pressing it.