“The best vintages I’ve been a part of”

“I’ve been in this game for, I think, 30 years nearly. These (24, 25) would be two of the best vintages I’ve been a part of, and that’s because things just seem to have happened at the right time.”

Transcript:

Michael Condon: Well, let’s turn our attention to wine now, because the harvest is nearly at close for vineyards in the state’s central west, with one grower describing it as the best season on record. The owner of Swinging Bridge Wines, Tom Ward, says they’re expecting to finish picking next week, while the high-altitude vineyards will be done by the end of the month. He spoke with the ABC’s Hamish Cole, starting with what the past few weeks have been like in the vineyard.

Tom Ward: Busy. It’s been a really amazing year in the sense here in, you know, for New South Wales compared to, so in the wine industry, Victoria and South Australia being really dry. Could be quite hot here in Orange. We haven’t had the extremes. Certainly the last week or two, we’ve had some warmer weather, which is probably not really end of February, start of March you wouldn’t normally see. But Orange has been a sea of activity, I suppose.

A lot of fruit coming off, and that’s across all altitudes. So we did see harvest start in early February in some of the lower altitude areas in orange with some of the whites. We’ve been in the midst of it the last, the last two weeks have been very heavy. I think when someone first said to me, there’s a cyclone, watch out for the cyclone rain coming down, I sort of, like everyone, was a bit like, well, yeah, cyclones won’t affect us straight away, you know, and obviously going through to Brisbane, the northern New South Wales and then we saw the rainfall you know 100 mil potentially was supposed to be on the Sunday just gone on Monday and then that pushed out a little and then at the moment we’ve had zero rain uh and they’re predicting one or two mils so it’s been quite a contrast I think everyone went pretty hard last week was pretty happy with the fruit like we’ve had that warm temperature so good sugar levels um quality’s been you know um high to very high like I you know it’s been one of those years I wish we’re gonna be like this every year um you know everything’s ripened we’ve got a lot of consistency with that and um you know it’s made winemaking a lot easier.

Hamish Cole: Yeah with the rainfall totals you mentioned before that you’ve only had you haven’t had any rain since early Feb what has that meant for the picking season?

Tom Ward: Yeah we’ve had a really interesting rainfall year here in Orange. I mean obviously we’ve got bud burst starting in October. We started with a full profile. We’ve had continual rain through October, November and we had large rain. So I was just looking at the data earlier actually. End of November and start of December I think we had 10 days or 12 days of straight rain and that was our flowering period. So that was a high disease period and we had to be really on the front foot. I know it’s been a lot of other vignerons it was you know you had to be on the sprayer to really make sure you’re on top of everything, control.

So then obviously we’re deeply concerned a lot of disease pressure and that was started December then December is actually quite dry and then towards the end of December a bit and then January we got some good storms and then February we had a couple but from the 15th of February we’ve had no rainfall here so 11th of March today, we’ve nearly had close to 25 days of no rain, low humidity as well. So a lot of those 20, 30% low humidity days. So again, that’s really good for no disease pressure. And then I think most people had good subsoil moisture here at Orange.

We’re in the vineyard here now and underneath us we’ve got green mid-row still, you know, and people find that hard to believe. When I talk to my mates in South Australia, etc, they’re all virtually dust and dry. We’re still slashing here, it’s been, so we do have subsoil moisture. It’s suited us really well to have this sort of stable weather now and then hopefully we’ve got a couple more weeks of stable weather, it looks like, and I reckon then, by the end of March, most of the fruit will be off here in orange and that’s, you know, I think there’s a lot of smiles starting to develop, but let’s not go too early.

Hamish Cole: And for you, how much longer do you have to go with picking?

Tom Ward: Yeah, we’ll finish next Wednesday. So, well, I hope we’re going to plan and, you know, there’s no rain ahead, but that’s where we’ve sort of got our schedule booked. We’re in some red grapes here right now. They’re 12 and a half sugar baume. We normally look at picking them around 13 and a half and you’ll get a bit of baume a week.

We’re thinking next Wednesday we’ll bring that off. Looks brilliant. You know, beautiful small berries, great colour.

Hamish Cole: And you touched on it before, but how’s the quality of the fruit looking that you’re picking?

Tom Ward: Yeah, I think we’ve been… Like, 25 yields have been really good. Yields… And with grapes, yields, it’s not a number-one factor. You don’t obviously want massive yields, so we have had to do a lot of work in the vineyard. And speaking to other vineyards around the place, there’s been a lot of work done in the vineyards, and I think that’s a great strength of Orange, to make sure we are growing quality.

You know, we had some set massive crops, so we would have dropped over half the crop on the ground. And that’s expensive and time-consuming. It’s been a lot of us in the vineyard doing a lot of selective stuff. So, you know, I always say, you know, you can’t make a silk purse from a sow’s ear, and it’s very much the same with grapes. The harder you work, the luckier you get with wine. There’s no hiding from the fact that the wine industry’s had a lot of troubles around the place in the last… You know, the China problem and export as a part in…you know, dealing with the bulk wine. You know, as a world market, there is some challenges there.

Look, to have 24 and 25 up there is sort of probably… Listen, I’ve been in this game for, I think, 30 years nearly. These would be two of the best vintages I’ve been a part of, and that’s because things just seem to have happened at the right time.

It’s easier to sell great wine than to sell crap wine. And, you know, so it’s pretty nice to be sitting here looking at and thinking we’ve got a pretty epic vintage ahead of us. The quality is off the charts. And I know people always, you know, in a marketing sense, can always say the best vintage ever.

But for us, we’re very optimistic. But, you know, these are early days. We’ve got to get these through ferments, put them into barrels, a lot of work. We’ve just bottled the 24s. They look very strong.

You know, Orange as a region’s got a lot to be positive about. Tourism’s still strong, cellar doors are doing well. And then in the broader market across, you know, Australia, in the markets, in the wholesale markets, Orange is in, you know, the right place with Chardonnay and Pinot Noir certainly being on the up. So I’m positive, but you’ve still got to work hard and it doesn’t stop. And, you know, I know vintage finishes next Wednesday, but that’s only the grapes. We’ve got to get the winemaking, then we’re going to sell it and we’re going to make sure we tell everyone the great story that we have here in Orange and what we are doing.

Michael Condon: Tom Ward, the owner of Orange Vineyard, Swinging Bridge, speaking there with Hamish Cole as they near the completion of the harvest and looking forward to the winemaking process.