Managing the canopy

The canopy’s management is a delicate endeavor performed in specific moments of the vine’s life cycle during spring and summer. It must be carried out with particular attention since it could compromise the health of the grapes. The goal is to maintain the canopy’s size, ensure that the vines’ leaves have ample exposure and, above all, function as a true canopy and eliminate unfavorable microclimatic conditions around the grapes. We defoliate the vines facing east immediately after bud set so the plant will have sun during the coolest hours of the day and avoid being “sunburned”. A week before the grapes fully ripen, we completely defoliate from east to west, again to prevent the grapes from being sunburned. The vines may seem "disheveled" if you take a walk through our vineyards before harvest. At first glance it may seem like lack of care but in reality it is definitely the opposite and is the result of precise and deliberate work. In fact, we do not trim any cultivated variety. Trimming consists of removing the apexes of the vine shoots, an action which inevitably creates stress on the vine. In each parcel we gently bend the shoots and encourage their growth horizontally. This leads to a better vegetative balance; the young leaves growing on the upper part are photosynthetically active and ensure that the grapes have the nourishment necessary to reach optimal ripeness. It is, in fact, the leaf that combines water and carbon dioxide to create the sugars which will then accumulate in the grapes.