Good morning Burgundy … good morning Côte de Nuits

Harvest of the whites continued in Meursault … and Chassagne and Puligny are also following. Ripeness is still quite low but in most cases, a bit of chaptalisation can do the trick and bring the wine up to 11.5% or 12%.

Cote de Nuits will start full scale on Monday, September 16th and then I fear that the full magnitude of the mildew destruction will become apparent. It’s bad … and I fear very bad in the area from Nuits-Saint-Georges to Chambolle …

Preliminary damage reports say 50% – 90% loss of grapes in these areas … and if this holds, then this is one of the worst devastation we have seen in Burgundy years … perhaps even in recent decades.

But let’s see … it’s easy to be too negative in advance … get the grapes on the sorting table!

Sorting … sorting … sorting

The mildew damage is really bad in Côte de Nuits … with dead berries in most of the clusters. It requires a lot of manual work at the sorting table to clear out these dead grapes and with a normal sorting team of 4 – 6 people it is simply not possible even when the table is stopped after each fill of grapes – note we are talking of the worst affected areas.

Some use more than 14 people at the sorting table and even two levels of “cleaning” of the clusters … one fully by hand and then the traditional sorting table … it is demanding and very time-consuming to remove all the dead berries damaged by the mildew.

This very thorough and intense sorting is carried out by geeky estates like Domaine Marchall – see below.

^{Photos from Domaine Marshalls Instagram profile}

This is however what it takes to clean up most of the mildew problem with dead and dry berries. Domaine Marshall and Domaine Pierre-Olivier Garcia have huge teams (20+) to clean the clusters of dead and dry berries.

Others are doing a very good job, but let’s face it 2 or 4 sorters at the table will not do the trick… not in 2024 and for that matter not in any vintage.

Please note it is not only the number of sorters that matters – it´s the amount of grapes each sorter should go through… i.e. speed of the table, stop of the table to sort ….

Bad sorting leaving bad grapes and dried grapes can badly influence the taste of the juice, preventing the clean and crystal clear Pinot flavours you can have with perfectly clean grapes.

You will be left with unclean notes and a feeling of a lack of precision… sometimes just not singingly clean – other times plain old fashion awful.

So … 2024 is hard work and meticulous sorting … and the dedication to see this through with a lot of sorters … whether these a paid or good friends.

It is people like Pierre-Olivier Garcia and Jean Marshall who takes Burgundy to another level in 2024 … or at least they try …

Other estates make special efforts to clean up the mildew mess … and I will try to describe these efforts as I encounter them.

What a mildew mess

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Harvest articles

• 2024 … it’s a wrap
• Burgundy 2024 – fermenting – Prices and Consequences
• Burgundy 2024 – fermenting – the serious issues
• Harvest 2024 – #day 15 – The end!
• Harvest 2024 – #day 14 – recharge
• Harvest 2024 – #day 13 – Full speed ahead
• Harvest 2024 – #day 12 – devastation and despair!
• Harvest 2024 – #day 11 – a close call
• Harvest 2024 – #day 10 – slow start to Côte de Nuits
• Harvest 2024 – #day 9 – Côte de Nuits starts
• Harvest 2024 – #day 8 – Saturday
• Harvest 2024 – #day 7 – Cool Friday
• Harvest 2024 – #day 6 – Sunny Thursday
• Harvest 2024 – #day 5 – Gloomy Wednesday
• Harvest 2024 – #day 4 – Tuesday
• Harvest 2024 – #day 3 – Monday
• Harvest 2024 – #day 2 – Sunday
• Harvest 2024 – #day 1 – harvest started
• Harvest 2024 – #07/09/2024 – start
• 2024 … harvest next week +
• 2024 … harvest in a month +

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