2025 Season at Three Feathers : A Rich & Abundant Journey
As we approach Harvest 2025, it is time to summarize this rich and abundant season.
We have had a good year with generous rainfall in the spring and relatively even weather ; no huge spikes of cold or hot, wet or dry. For some reason, which we cannot understand, this has been a year of very heavy production in all the plants in the gardens and the vineyard.
Cherry trees, both wild and domestic, produced record crops. The wild cherries by the house dropped so much fruit that we were raking it up. The apple trees are loaded and limbs need to be supported to keep them from breaking. Our table grapes the same. Flowering plants produced abundant flowers and all the plant material was growing overtime.
This year’s rich activity in the vineyards has been completely determined by the unusual growing conditions. We have had the same response from the vines as the other plants on the property. The entire summer has been taken up with cutting the vines back, keeping them from being in the way of the tractors for spraying.
Even after veraison, when the plants normally stop producing shoots, the vines kept pushing out growth at the trunks, flowers and fruit. Some of the vines, especially the Dijon clones 667, had ripening clusters and green clusters side by side.
As of this week, September 15th, we are still “hedging” plants – cutting back excess growth that overhangs the aisles.
Looking Forward
I am anticipating a record crop of grapes for 2025 throughout the entire valley.
Our lovely 2024 Pinot Gris and popular Pinot POP have been out on the shelves this year and selling well in many local stores, including New Seasons Markets and Market of Choice (see our Find Our Wines page for locations).
Aside from harvesting 2025 fruit, I have been canning juice that I use all winter for smoothies as a healthy addition to our diet.
