By the Paso Robles Wine Country Alliance
As summer embraces Paso Robles, activity hums through vineyards and wineries. With harvest still months away, August finds vineyard managers and winemakers deep in crucial work, shaping the 2025 vintage, nurturing 2024 wines, and preparing 2023 reds for release. This highlights the meticulous care that defines Paso Robles wine country, a delicate balance of growing grapes and crafting wine.
Out in the vineyards, the focus is on managing the leafy canopy and optimizing the fruit for the upcoming 2025 harvest. The season’s cool start has been good for grapevine leaf and shoot growth, especially given less winter rain than usual. However, this cooler beginning could make vines less resilient to heat waves that might arrive closer to harvest, as grapes and vines generally prefer some early-season warmth to get used to the heat.
Many vineyard teams have completed shoot thinning, an important early task that removes extra new shoots, ensuring the vine’s energy goes towards a balanced crop. Leafing, or removing leaves, is in process. This strategic removal of leaves around the grape clusters is vital for letting air circulate, which greatly reduces disease risk, and for allowing sun exposure, leading to more even ripening and better flavor. This careful balancing of the vine’s energy between roots, leaves, and fruit is essential, with the current focus firmly on the fruit.
A common sight this time of year is lifting wires. These movable wires, stored low on the vine during winter, are now carefully raised to position and support the strong, well-developed canopy. This practice, especially in vineyards where vines are trained VSP (Vertical Shoot Positioned), ensures orderly vine growth, maximizing sunlight capture and airflow. Cluster thinning, where some grape bunches are deliberately removed, is also in process and optimizes the vine’s balance and enhances the quality of the remaining grape clusters, ensuring concentrated flavors and good ripeness.
Paso Robles vineyard managers are also deep into counting grape clusters and estimating the size of the harvest, closely monitoring how berries are growing after fruit set (when flowers turn into tiny berries). These early predictions are critical for anticipating the size of the 2025 harvest and guiding future winemaking decisions. General remarks indicate a promising outlook, with the crop described as “average to average plus.” This suggests good and consistent yields with little-to-no shatter (when berries fail to develop), a positive sign for the vintage’s potential. Despite a cooler growing season so far, the 2025 vintage shows immense promise, with some comparing its potential to a mix of the previous two vintages. Much can still change before harvest, but the foundation for an exciting season is certainly being laid.
Many vineyards are now preparing bird protection strategies, like netting or innovative bird lasers, to deter birds from feasting on ripened grapes. With veraison (when grapes begin to change color and soften) on the horizon, vineyard teams are patiently awaiting the 45-60 days from veraison to harvest, carefully monitoring fruit progress. Underlying all this meticulous work is a constant eye towards preparing for the upcoming crush (harvesting and processing grapes), with thorough cleaning of all vineyard equipment already underway, ensuring smooth operations for another exciting harvest.
While vineyards are active, Paso Robles wineries are quietly hard at work. In the cellar, winemakers are diligently topping off barrels, which prevents oxygen from spoiling the wine and to ensure the pristine quality of the 2024 vintage. These young wines are maturing gracefully, already showing vibrant depth and freshness. As 2024 red wines mature in barrel, many wineries are engaged in initial blending trials, providing a glimpse into what finished wines could be like in the next 12 months.
Simultaneously, focus is on the culmination of the 2023 vintage, particularly the red wines. Winemakers are in the final stages of blending, tasting and adjusting for ideal flavor and texture balance. The 2023 reds are generating significant excitement, since the 2023 vintage is often likened to 2011, characterized as a cooler year than typical in Paso Robles.
Bottling is now in full swing. This labor-intensive process is carefully monitored at every step to preserve wine quality, ensuring the finished product reflects the hard work of its creation. From vine to bottle, the passion of Paso Robles winemakers is evident, promising a delightful experience for wine lovers in years to come.
PASO ROBLES PRESS MAGAZINE
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