Beautiful Indian Summer here in Oregon.  Rained a bit this am, but forecast is for 10 days of sunshine (can we really believe that)??

Wayne Parker, Melrose Vineyards

Wayne is standing in this picture with his new purchase!  Up until 2 years ago, all our wines were pressed using two of these Italian bladder presses…what can I say…it is bittersweet, like losing an old friend.

Visitors came by the winery last Wed. Cyndi and Lenora from Newberg. (Cyndi is a wine buyer from Fred Meyer and Lenora works for Oak Knoll, they both do many other things in addition to that).  If you get a chance to meet these two, you will be in for a wonderful surprise (and lots of fun).  Thanks for lightening us up!

Cheers to our new friends, Cyndi & Lenora

Terry...are you...stuck?

Since Elkton is so small, (240 Population), folks kind of wander in….

Marty Tomaselli from our local restaurant, stopping by to share words of wisdom!

The plan (as of today), is to harvest the Ferris Wheel
Estate Vineyard on Friday.  So…I need to get my act together and get a crew put together to help me raise the bird netting.  In the meantime… more and more grapes.

Please check out our new web design, it is not completely finished, but getting there!

brandborgwine.com

CHEERS!

Terry relaxing...

North Umpqua River

Relaxing at the Steamboat Inn..our first day off in however long I can remember.

Vintage is shaping up to be fruit delivered all at once….warm day today, keep bringing them on!  Off to get a sample of our own 5 acres Estate (Ferris Wheel Vineyard), pinot noir. Last checked it was at 19 brix… Will report tomorrow what it is currently.

Umpqua River from Elkton

Terry is taking me to the North Umpqua to the steamboat Inn for a Birthday celebration ( a sales call as well)…will update you with details  (maybe not all of them )

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/10/02/WIH9134F5E.DTL

10/9 and 10/10, I spent 11 1/2 hours each day out in the vineyard applying our bird netting…whew…glad that has been completed. Real satisfaction knowing our crop won’t go to the birds!

Yesterday, Terry processed 7 tons of pinot noir from the South Fork Vineyard  (maintained by Melrose Vineyard),all by himself.  I went off to host a dinner in Roseburg for Women for Wine Sense.  Hilda Jones from Abacela invited them down and since they didn’t stop by our tasting room, I got to serve Brandborg wines for their dinner held at the Wildlife Safari in Roseburg.  What a great bunch of women!  I had a blast!

Photos follow

The chefs (Carla & Scott Rutter) Hilda Jones and myself

Hilda Jones from Abaceala playing with my props (is this what they do at these dinners)??

The Women 4 Wines Sense Group (CA,OR & WA represented)

Sue’s first bin “dump”

Photos from yesterday…

Things were pretty quiet today at the winery, the fruit we were supposed to receive will arrive tomorrow.

On the vineyard side of things, all our measures to drive away the cedar waxwings have been unsuccessful.   For those of you who aren’t familiar with them, they are a very beautiful small (migratory) bird, light gray with a yellow belly and a black mask like a raccoon. They send in their scouts and when the fruit starts to get close to ripening, they invite their whole extended families to join in on the feeding frenzy!  It is enough to make a grapegrower grouchy and anxious.  So we are rounding up some troups to help apply our netting tomorrow.  A lot of labor, but when compared to losing your whole crop to birds, there is no comparison. We can’t quite figure out why they seem to be attracted to our vineyard and not the others in the area.  Maybe due to the fact that we are an isolated hilltop, or maybe just because they know a good taste when they do!

Cold temp last evening 42 degrees…don’t want to be concerned about cold now too!  Farming is farming and control what you can and let the rest GO!  It is easier said than done for me,,,

Cheers and looking forward to another day tomorrow!

“]

Bobby Lees & Henry

More photos to follow as soon as I figure it out!  Exciting day, fruit arrived in great shape, clusters are smaller from this vineyard than they were last year.  Grape flavor!!!  I experienced dumping the grape bins into the hopper, using the forklift, (might not seem like much, but it really is).  Couldn’t get the smile off my face.

My husband, Terry , is a master with the forklift, he teases that he attended Fork U.

More grape fun tomorrow : )

Sue