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as one of the truly great vintages for Virginia.” He describes the ideal weather for producing grapes as “a cool damp spring, followed by a warm dry summer, followed by a cool dry harvest period (August to October l followed by rains in winter.
“Last year was a drought year which means the vines produced fruit of exceptional quality.”
The fruit had very high sugars and small berries which increases flavor. He says the' “wines will be extremely flavorful, very aromatic, and have a little higher alcohol content due to higher sugar levels.”
Also the acid level is good which will produce wines that he calls “bright not flabby”. Alcohol and acid levels are important for taste as well as for creating wines that will last on the shelf and not spoil or even start their fermentation process anew.
For the local wine business, there has been great upheaval on the legal front owing to recent court rulings in Virginia and New York.
The Virginia “Farm Wineries Act” permitted wineries to sell their wines directly to consumers without requiring a distributor but prevented such sales from out-of-state vineyards.
So it was an effort to both protect and promote Virginia wines. New York had similar legislation. But the courts have used the commerce clause and the 21st amendment to the constitution to strike down the provision on out-ofstate sales to in-state residents. The situation is now in the hands of both the appeals process and the legislature.
Gray Ghost says Virginia wineries
93.7%