It is veraison time in Virzì

Last year we were a bit worried that the heat could have slowed down this process; is unusual to have so high temperatures . This year we bring an extra baggage with us, that is the thirty years’ experience that will help in the next harvest.
The temperatures are now unpredictable but we have learned that the earth always finds a way to deal with them and, with an extra years of experience, we can say that nature always does it very well.
Veraison is the phase during which the final period of grape ripening begins and in red grapes it coincides with the change of the skin color.
With veraison in the red grape varieties, the progressive accumulation of anthocyanins in the skin occurs with the consequent turning towards purplish red, while in the white grape varieties the transition to the yellow color is due to the accumulation of carotenoids and flavonoids.
It is important to remember that in the skin there are substances that give the wine not only the color, but also its aromas.
From veraison to ripening usually 30-35 days pass for red vines, a little less for white ones. The variability, however, does not only concern the type of grape, but also the weather conditions which in recent years have increasingly extreme.

Beyond the rise in temperatures, the thing that strikes us most is the violence and unpredictability of weather events.

The climatic trend in the various seasons nowadays is difficult to frame, every year we record something different. It becomes more and more important to listen to the plants to be able to learn the right times because they will be less and less predictable.

Soon we will start taking grape samples to carefully assess the situation. We will see the changes day by day until they are ready to be harvested. This year, nature responded to the heat immediately in an excellent way, giving healthy and strong fruit.

Every year in this period many questions and many thoughts arise, I would say normal, before the start of one of the most important phases of the annual journey. As we often say, a path ends to start a new one.