courtesy Brisbane News Wine 2nd May 2012
A bit of a tight spot!
I got into a bit of a pickle on the Hill of Dreams while I was spraying on Saturday. As you can see I managed to jack-knife the spray rig between a big Box tree & the vine rows!
Luckily I’m the boss & so I had to go easy while berating myself for being so bloody stupid.
The flat surface in the foreground is the roof of the tractor cab with a vine row end post just visible beside the front left corner of the cab.
The only way I could get out (short of knocking down vines) was to get another tractor & attach a tow chain around the spray rig’s right (in the photo) axle & drag it 2m to the right. Luckily I got away with it & nothing was broken – bar my pride & my larynx from swearing so loudly! What have you done recently that is equally dumb – come on, own up.
Nick Ryan on ’09 Topper’s Mountain wild ferment Pinotage Viognier
Topper’s Mountain is a Single Estate label. This means you can see & taste each different season in each vintage you try. No buying grapes in from other growers to try to make blends that are the same, vintage after vintage.
Mike (Hayes, our winemaker) & I are staking our futures on doing exciting & different things using only Topper’s Mountain grapes, often using techniques that are not mainstream to produce wines that truely reflect “our place” with the ultimate aim having some fun producing wines that you enjoy drinking regularly.
One of our current wines that is definitely “left field” is the 2009 wild ferment Pinotage Viognier. Nick Ryan wrote a very good piece on it in Gourmet Traveller last week where he talks about being different. I’ll leave it up to him, just follow the link - GTW_Nick Ryan – ’09 Pinotage Viognier (the piece begins near the bottom of the last column on page 1).
I’ll be scribing again soon; I feel a blog coming on re the touch on the shoulder I recently got from a mining company wanting to explore for bauxite at Topper’s Mountain – I’ll keep you posted. Fingers (& toes) crossed I can talk them out of it one way or another!
Under water on the Mountain!
The rain tumbles down in November! It started on Wednesday morning & hasn’t really stopped since. We’re up to 158mm so far with no respite in sight until later tomorrow. Unfortunately we’re right in the middle of flowering, so this isn’t good! Flowering is when botrytis has its first chance to infiltrate what will become the berries. It means that we’ll have to do alot of spraying in the next couple of days as this has also been a primary & secondary infection event for Downey Mildew. Ah, the joys of a Vigneron.
This rain has been falling across all of New England.
Aside from the rain, the vineyard looks excellent. We’ve spent alot of time leading up to the rain doing shoot thinning in all blocks. Mind you, they needed it as most varieties have put out plenty of basal shoots (shoots on the cordon in addition to the buds left at pruning). These additional basal shoots carry very little fruit and shade the fruit zone increasing humidity, reducing air flow & increasing the likelihood of disease.
The Nebbiolo, Pinot Noir & Chardonnay are nearly finished flowering & beginning fruit set. There is a little bit of “hen & chicken” where the “chickens” are small berries about the size of a peppercorn & never develop fully. This is the result of things not going swimmingly during flowering with the fertilisation process not going to plan.
Tony Love’s Top 100 Aussie Wines
Tannat’s home is the Basque-influenced regions of France near the Pyrénées. The wine is notable for its very high tannin levels and in this area is often blended with Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet franc and Fer to soften the astringency and make it more approachable. (Extract from Wikipedia) Have a look at http://www.vinodiversity.com/tannat.html for more info.
Our 2009 Topper’s Mountain Tannat was included in Tony Love’s Australian Top 100 Wines, scoring 94 points in the Daily Telegraph last week. This wine is building an impressive record with James Halliday giving it 93 points and it winning a gold medal at the 2011 New England Wine Show. Here’s the link to an extract of Tony Love’s entry.
Topper’s Mountain No.1 @ 2011 New England Wine Show
It was Topper’s Mountain Wines which stole the show at the New England’s night of nights on Friday when it took out 4 of the top trophies including the coveted Champion Winery of Show at the 2011 New England Wine Show.
Renowned wine critic Huon Hooke chaired the panel of judges at a show that he openly admits he was “…without much of an idea of what I would expect to find.” And was pleased to find that this “tiny little wine region… making a bigger range of interesting wines than they have in Coonawarra” where he has gone onto judge at their wine show this week.
Interviewed from the region on Thursday after the one day judging which saw a record 154 wines judged by the expert panel, Huon told the ABC that the potential for the region was great. He made reference to the extraordinary number of less mainstream varieties that were of gold medal standard at this show and thought that perhaps varieties like Gewurztraminer and Tempranillo were styles on which the region could “hang their hat”.
Topper’s Mountain couldn’t be happier with these claims that the less mainstream varieties are set to thrive in the region as they are almost as far from mainstream wine producers as their remote vineyard is from civilisation.
Recently quoted as having the ‘ultimate fruit salad’ vineyard, owner Mark Kirkby of Topper’s Mountain has trialled plantings of 28 varieties in his 10ha vineyard since first planting in 2000, many with as few as 200 vines of each clone or variety. Mark’s aim is to narrow these 28 down to 8-10 star performers through grape quality work in the vineyard in conjunction with ongoing wine style evolution with winemaker Mike Hayes to show off the exciting, cool-climate terroir of Topper’s Mountain.
Located in spectacular yet remote countryside north-west of Armidale, about 50km north-west of the New England’s highest town Guyra, Topper’s Mountain reaps the benefit of altitudes in excess of 900m, ensuring idyllic growing conditions for his far-from-mainstream cool climate varietals. The vineyard is situated on beautiful, deep, red & aged volcanic soils high above the valleys of the MacIntyre and Gwydir Rivers.
“It doesn’t seem real” says owner Mark Kirkby after winning 4 trophies, 6 gold, 2 silver and 5 bronze medals on Friday night “we couldn’t have timed it better having just made our first, albeit small, commercial release of wines under the new Topper’s Mountain label.”
It seemed the 2009 Topper’s Mountain Nebbiolo (RRP $35) couldn’t put a foot wrong, at first being awarded the Trophy for “Best Other Red Variety”, then “Chief Stewards Pick of Golds” (which also takes into account the winery’s contribution to the region), then finally the big one, “New England Wine of Show”. Together with the 2010 Topper’s Mountain Gewurztraminer (RRP $30) taking out the Trophy for “Best Aromatic White Wine”, had Topper’s Mountain named “Champion Winery of Show”.
This is the first year which gold medal winners at the New England Wine Show qualify to enter in Australia’s National Wine Show held in Canberra each year, giving this small region even more opportunity to show the wider wine world just what great things the region is doing.
Just last year the New England Wine region developed a Regional Brand Strategy aimed at raising the profile and awareness of Australia’s newest wine region, and this the first wine show since, gives the NEW (New England Wine) region great promise from which to leverage its marketability, having hosted perhaps one of Australia’s most regarded wine critics. Mark Kirkby sits on the marketing and branding strategy committee.
Topper’s Mountain are seeking distribution of their wines in the on premise market in Sydney and Brisbane.
For further information contact:-
- Mark Kirkby – Topper’s Mountain Wines, mark@topper’s.com.au (0411) 880 580
- Kylie White – Winestream Communications, info@winestream.com.au (02) 9439 1633
Alternate varieties lead the way in New England
The judges deliberate - Deanne Eaton, Houn Hooke, Steven Doyle, Jemma West, Mike DeGaris & Charles Whish (photo courtesy of the Glen Innes Examiner)
I’m guessing, but I’ll bet it’s not happened often that a winery wins the Champion Winery of Show on the Australian wine show circuit with a team consisting entirely of alternate variety wines! Well, Topper’s Mountain Wines managed this at the 2011 New England Wine Show in Glen Innes last week.
Huon Hooke was Chair of Judges & commented on our Nebbiolo “I would also like to say how great the Nebbiolo was that was produced by Topper’s Mountain. It’s a very, very good one,” he said. “A lot of people have tried and failed, but this one was fantastic.”
Huon went on to say “Right from the word go we tried a number of top wines and I hadn’t realised before how many beautiful wines and producers there were in this region. It really was an eye opener for me, as the region has a lot of strings to its belt, especially with the large amount of grape varieties.”
The wines that contributed to the Championship success were;
- 2010 Topper’s Mountain Gewurztraminer – Gold & trophy for Best Aromatic Wine of Show
- 2009 Topper’s Mountain Nebbiolo – Gold & trophies for Best New England Wine of Show, Best Other Variety Red Wine of Show & the Chief Steward’s Trophy
- 2009 Topper’s Mountain Red Earth Child – Gold
- 2009 Topper’s Mountain Pinotage Viognier – Bronze
Other medals were;
- 2009 Topper’s Mountain Tannat – Gold
- 2009 topper’s Gewurztraminer – Gold
- 2010 Topper’s Mountain wild ferment Viognier – Bronze
- 2009 Topper’s Mountain Pinotage Viognier – Bronze
- 2010 topper’s Chardonnay – Bronze
- 2009 topper’s Tempranillo – Bronze
- 2005 topper’s Traminer – Gold
- 2005 thunderbolt’s Riesling Traminer – Silver
- 2005 topper’s Chardonnay – Silver
Budburst away @ Topper’s Mountain
Nebbiolo (top) & chardy - 22nd Sept (pics x Greg James, Minbari Grafting)
Well, the green bit of Vintage 2012 has begun – budburst is underway!
This means we’re in FROST RISK territory. I used not to be too worried about this – until Oct 16th last year when we got hammered by a massive frost which wiped out 75% of our vintage. Now I worry!
Henry is flat out fixing up the broken wires from the pre-pruner & tomorrow he will get some wood for frost fire piles to be put on the west, south & east sides of the vineyard – we know we won’t get a frost if there is a northerly wind blowing. If a frost event looks likely, the piles are lit around midnight & green wood etc is put on to cause smoke to hopefully protect the vineyard. The backup method is to use a helicopter but its expensive & I can only find one chopper rated to fly at night but they won’t commit to be available at short notice.
Back to the vines – as usual Nebbiolo has come out of the blocks very fast. I wish I could send it back for a false start (like Usain Bolt in the 100m Worlds) – it makes a vigneron’s life tough by being first to budburst & one of the last couple of varieties to harvest at the other end of the vintage.
Things were happening about 10 days ago but luckily we got a cold change & four frosts or very near frosts on the trot from the 11th to 14th Sept., which slowed things down. Then warm again – the last week has been warm (23-26degC) with cool nights (3-7degC). This wide diurnal temperature range is typical of Topper’s at this time of year.
No rain or dangerously cold weather in sight (hopefully), so all looks good so far.