Last month Dick Shea was featured on Wine Library TV and sat down Gary V to taste a few Shea Vineyard wines. Dick mentioned Panther Creek Cellars’ 1994 Shea Pinot noir as the wine that put his vineyard on the map. We’re still going at it, and currently you can taste the 2006 Shea in our tasting room.

Last week we processed grapes from Shea’s 2009 harvest. The grapes taste great and, despite the below-average rainfall for the valley this year, the grapes are surprisingly plump without too much shriveling.

I caught up with Assistant Winemaker Bill Hanson to ask a few questions about the upcoming harvest.

Ryan Fish: When do you expect harvest to start?

Bill Hanson: If we had to guess we would say the fourth weekend of September. If we get a lot of heat then we’ll start the third week, but I don’t think that’s going to happen.

RF: Which vineyards come in first? Last?

BH: Shea, block 30, is consistently the first one. Temperance Hill Pinot noir and Elton Chardonnay usually come in last.

RF: The 2009 growing season had similar growing degree days as ’06 and ’03, but what was different?

BH: In 2003 the heat came late, along with a lot of hot wind. 2006 I don’t think was as hot, or at least didn’t have the heat spikes as we have in 2009. We’ve had a few pretty big spikes, but we’ve also had some nice rains this year, a half inch or so once a month. So the rain relieved the stress caused by the heat spikes.

RF: What’s different around the winery this year?

BH: We’ve got our two harvest interns returning and they’ll be veterans, and we might have one more intern this year than last. We have the same vineyards as last year. We’re experimenting with one new cooper, but nothing else really noteworthy.

RF: Will the wines be similar to other years?

BH: We really can’t say until the wine is made. We’ll take another year with the quality that we had last year, sure, but every year is different so we’ll just have to hope for the best.

On Sunday evening our Cellar Direct Club and Reserve Board and members enjoyed barrel tasting, festivities, and a gourmet dinner at the winery. The weather cooperated with sunny skies and a cool breeze, and round tables reached from the crush pad out into the backyard garden where everyone was treated with delicious spicy sausage, fresh mozzarella, and ice cream in waffle cones. Michael Stevenson and Bill Hanson strutted about pouring barrel samples of the 2008 Freedom Hill Pinot noir, our single-barrel, club-exclusive bottling, and mingling with the guests. Nick from Nick’s Italian Café manned the barbeque while his daughter Carmen and her husband Eric tended to the buffet line.

Pouring wine for each table afforded me the chance to meet the folks who are most passionate about drinking our wine. Couples and groups of friends shared stories about Panther Creek wine from as far back as the early nineties. The one thing I heard the most was that they’ve never opened a bottle they didn’t like, and that they can’t wait for next year.

Cheers!

If you get a chance to see a field of Pinot noir vines up close then take a minute to notice the veraison, or change of color in the grapes from green to dark purple. Most clusters are purple with just a few green grapes lagging behind. It’s a reminder that harvest is just around the corner.

The winery has also come alive as Michael and Bill start planning next years blend and preparing for harvest. The once-empty counters in the back are now covered with vials filled with single barrel samples and experimental blends. The hiss of nitrogen tanks and roar of forklifts are a nice change after a few months of quiet. Last week I walked in on our two winemakers and our harvest intern all sitting at a round table with 10 glasses of wine in front of each person. It reminded me of a poker game and their faces were just as serious.

The tasting room here at Panther Creek is located right inside the winery, so stop by and see it all happening.