It’s winter, the dawn of a new year, and here in Sonoma County that means pruning season has arrived! This is the time when we bundle up and take to the vineyards with our trusty, Swiss shears to make big decisions about the upcoming vintage. Pruning allows us to control the yield of the vine, and ultimately the quality of the wine. It’s a crucial first step in our quest to make wine from the best fruit possible.

By now the vines have been dormant for some time, essentially nestled in for their winter’s nap. It’s our job to go around and give them neat little haircuts while they rest, as I did recently in our Baranoff Vineyard (pictured above, pre-haircut). Pruning is one way we attempt to help the plant stay in balance with itself. We examine each vine’s performance from the previous year to determine how much fruit it can healthfully support. Then we decide what should be removed from the plant in order to help it thrive and use its energy optimally.

In our vineyards we select only the best cane or two from each individual vine to produce grapes for the next harvest. That means we end up cutting several canes from each plant during pruning. From the two canes that remain, we choose buds to save based on where we want next year’s fruit to grow and how much. Then we cut off all the rest of the buds. In the spring the buds we keep will send bright green shoots straight up toward the sun. Leaves and tiny clusters will begin to grow from the shoots, and from the clusters, flowers, and from the flowers, grapes.

We strive to keep vines in balance because it’s the best way to produce wines of balance. If we ask the vine to give us more fruit than it should, the resulting wine can be flabby and overly simple, seemingly watered down. If we don’t allow the vine to produce enough fruit, it can overcompensate and send its energy elsewhere, potentially producing canopy or mold issues, or vegetal flavors in wine. So, we work to hear what each vine is telling us about its own particular sweet spot. We strive to nudge it ever closer to its potential with each new vintage. And pruning is the reset button. The promise of a fresh start, like a New Year’s resolution between grower and vine.