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Tenuta Montemagno in inverno

Work in the vineyard and cellar of Tenuta Montemagno at the end of winter

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Article written in collaboration with Roberto Nantiat and Gianfranco Cordero, winemakers of Tenuta Montemagno

A few days ago we entered the spring season, the period in which the vineyard wakes up from its winter rest and prepares to be reborn to bear those wonderful fruits that we will harvest at the end of the summer season. In the last article, we learnt what work had to be done at the beginning of the cold season.

In this one, we will see with Roberto Nantiat, the oenologist who, together with Gianfranco Cordero, follows the work at Tenuta Montemagno, what has been done in the second half of the winter and how we are preparing for the spring awakening.

Let us begin by pointing out that from January to the present (we are now in the last ten days of March), winter has been characterised by mild temperatures. 

Roberto Nantiat

Only in February, and for less than a week, temperatures dropped below freezing. As far as precipitation is concerned, it must also be said that it has been decidedly scarce, indicating a continuity of drought that has persisted since last year.

In the vineyard, all pruning was completed; the shoots that had been cut at the end of the harvest were removed completely.

Since the beginning of March, we have been bending and tying the fruit heads to allow the plants to start sprouting for the new vintage.

It was precisely in this latter period that a much faster vegetative recovery than normal vine activity was noted.

In fact, the presence of the first cotton buds was observed, a sign that these are swelling, when normally in March the first ‘weeping’ of the vines should have been seen.

It must be said, however, that these weeping did take place, even if, due to the low amount of water reserve, they were not as vigorous as can normally be observed.

Vigna inverno

The climatic changes observed last year, and in particular from the end of the 2022 harvest to the present, were the subject of a meeting between oenologists and Tenuta Montemagno’s agronomist, Maurizio Cerrato. The purpose of the meeting was to define a strategy to be implemented in order to deal in the best possible conditions with the adversities brought about by the weather and not only. In fact, this year a number of new natural-based products will be used to support the plants both against water shortages and to supplement and reinforce their defences against attacks by parasites and fungi.

In the cellar, bottling of all the white wines continued (an activity that should be completed by the end of March), while, again towards the end of the month, the TM Brut will be drawn, thus initiating the second fermentation in the bottle with yeasts and sugars to produce the bubbles. At the beginning of March, the Grignolino was bottled, while for all the other red wines the ageing phase continued, depending on the type of wine, in tanks or in barrels.We can say that the winter was a season of work to prepare the vineyards in the best possible way and to activate the strategies that will allow nature to work in the best conditions with. the arrival of fine weather. The next appointment with our editorials dedicated to Tenuta Montemagno’s vineyards and winery is scheduled for July; on that occasion we will be able to tell you what was done during the Spring 2023.

Tenuta Montemagno in inverno

Winter work in vineyard and cellar of Tenuta Montemagno

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Article written in collaboration with Roberto Nantiat and Gianfranco Cordero, winemakers of Tenuta Montemagno

A question that we often hear during guided tours of the cellar: “… but in the winter months the cellar is closed so you are on vacation?”

It would be really nice to be able to rest for so many months, but nature never sleeps!

Thus, after the 2022 harvest, in Tenuta Montemagno, as well as in all wine cellars, we enter the period of winter and pre-spring activities of maintenance in the vineyard and wine processing in the cellar.

vigna Timorasso in inverno

Let’s go back for a moment to October and November, when winter has not yet arrived in full force. In these months the plants marked out and cut during the months of July and August are removed to make place for the vine cuttings, planted in autumn and, after the cold months, in spring.

This is an important operation to always maintain a cultivation capable of ensuring a yield per hectare adequate to the production quantities expected in the years to come. It will take three years before the vine cuttings produce the precious fruits and can make their contribution to the production.

During the short days of the long winter months, ordinary maintenance works are carried out on the vineyard with the replacement of damaged poles and wires, in order to refine the arrangement and the supporting structure of the vineyard and prepare it for spring. We then proceed to observe the state of the soil after a year, 2022, characterized by extreme and persistent drought.

This year, to strengthen the root system of the vines, we carried out fertilization interventions with organic material; this operation ensures an increase in oxygenation for the nutrients present in the clods and improves the water retention conditions (during the expected rainy periods), and its release on sunny days.

cisterne Tenuta Montemagno

It is very important that the soil is in the best possible condition as early as spring to create a water reserve capable of helping the vineyard during the vegetative restart.

Now let’s move to the cellar, where constant temperature and humidity reign, a perfect microclimate for storing wine. About the end of autumn, the alcoholic fermentations are completed. We then proceed with the cold setting of the tanks for the white wines, regulating them so that they maintain a constant temperature of around 6°/8° C.

In this way the malolactic fermentation (which would lead to an undesired increase in the alcohol content of the final product) is blocked.

For red wines, on the other hand, this fermentation is stimulated by regulating the temperature of the tanks around 20°C. The consequent result is a softening and biological stabilization of the wine. Once these activities have been completed, and we have now reached the middle of winter, we proceed with the refinement and then with the bottling.

The winter of 2022-2023 was distinguished, from a climatic point of view and at least for the first period, by anomalous high temperatures. After the first cold days of November and a light snowfall, temperatures have risen almost excessively. Even before the mid-November cold, the leaves remained on the plants; the autumn foliage took place late, signalling, in practice, that the plants perceived that winter had not yet arrived and, in turn, delaying the dormancy phase. All this will involve a careful and precise intervention by our agronomist who will serve, on the one hand, to evaluate the state of the vines and, on the other, to give indications about any ad hoc interventions to be carried out before starting the spring pruning.

We will talk about the final winter works and those of early spring in the next article dedicated to the works in Tenuta Montemagno, scheduled for March/April. See you soon!