Liebkind Ried Kobeln 2014

Site & soil

The Blaufränkisch grapes for this wine are grown in our highest-situated vineyard, on the southern slope of the Spitzerberg. When we bought this piece of land, it had lain fallow for many many years: the soil in this 1.1 hectare parcel is so dry and poor that farmers feared damaging their machines and therefore did not cultivate it.

In 2008, we planted vines selected from our oldest vineyards, and made our first experiments with organic farming in this site. We also seeded many herbs and flowers between the vines, as well as planting fruit trees around the vineyard in order to enhance the biological diversity. Soon, this vineyard saw itself promoted from the position of being our ‘experiment’ to that of our dearest vineyard site. Hence the name Liebkind (Darling).

Harvest & vinification

Yields are extremely low. The young vines have to struggle with the extremely dry and poor soil; they suffer exposure to strong winds and maximum exposure to the sun. As a result, the berries are as tiny as a blue currant and the 1.1 hectare site never yields more than 1000 kg of grapes. In 2014, an extremely challenging vintage, we produced a total of 500 liters from this vineyard.

The wine, though, is exciting. Charming with fruit and the roundness of young vines on one side, but very dense and compact due to the low yields. The small berries provide racy acidity and demanding tannins. It is a wine of extremes.

Vintage 2014

2014 saw an exceptionally difficult end to the vegetation cycle. Rain began in mid-August, sometimes in massive volume, and soggy conditions persisted for several weeks. Berries and stems of the already ripening clusters were threatened by a great risk of rot, which is why many winegrowers tended to harvest as early as possible. But we went the other way and waited for perfect maturity, with the disadvantage that we found many clusters unusable. Ultimately, the total yield this year was barely 40% of an average harvest.