Ok, I’ll admit, I don’t much about cover crops. In reality, I don’t even have much time right now to research what I’d like from a cover crop. With that in mind, I turned to Mark Greene and asked what he used in his 5 acre vineayrd. Turns out, he uses Buckwheat. He choose that because the roots tend to go deep and break up the soil, allowing for better drainage. Makes sense to me! And it’s available at the local farm supply stores…additionally it’s fast growing. so even though I should have planted my field last fall, this might do well…we’ll have to see!

I’ll probably throw in some wildflower seeds as well…

Here’s an article on Buckwheat as a cover crop:

Buckwheat: A Beneficial Cover Crop

If idle hands are the devil’s playthings, then idle soil must certainly be the devil’s playground. Today we talk about cover crops. Ways to cover your bare soil and keep it healthy and weed free when you’re not using it to garden in and it’s an organic gardening technique that every one should incorporate into their gardening regimen.

Probably the “A,” number one, most favorite cover crop used by organic gardeners is this one. It’s buckwheat. Any time you’re going to have bare soil for a month or more, sow two-to-three pounds of buckwheat per thousand square feet. The stuff germinates quickly, grows very rapidly. And then, when you’re ready to plant something like this corn, just hole a row right down the middle and plant.

But wait, there’s more! Not only does the buckwheat suppress weeds, control erosion, and return nutrients to the soil when you till it in, but it also supports predacious insects like hover flies or surfant flies that prey on like aphids and other garden pests.

You can also just bend some of the stems over and let it act as a mulch for your squash vine. All things considered, buckwheat or a good cover crop can replace the use of a number of chemicals, herbicides, insecticides in your garden. It’s an organic gardening technique that’s bound to be good for your garden.

Last spring, I planted 300 vines over five rows in my backyard. The bottom 2.5 rows are planted with Cab. Franc on 101-14 and the upper five rows are Cabernet Sauvignon on 3309.

To layout those rows was pretty simple. I took a 300′ tape measure and marked out the location of the end posts and vines using a 6′ between the plants and 10′ between the rows. I marked the location of the plants initially with flags, the type bought at Loews with a small yellow flag mounted on about a foot of wire.

Marking the location of the vines was done, because I didn’t prepare the ground properly…I simply augered a 12″ hole 36″ deep in my lawn. Thus the flags were used instead of marking with lime, as I feared the lime would wash away if it rained. The day of planting, I marked the locations for the vine holes, pulled the flags and then the tractor operator drilled the hole.

This spring, with the vineyard properly cultivated and subsoiled, and with an intention of planting 700 vines, my methods need to group up a little. I had hoped to hire a local viticulture consultant, but like so many others here in the South, he failed to ever show up. Not quite sure why that is, but I rather than call him back, I decided it was a sign that I should just give it a go myself. Trial by fire if you will.

My primary objective are straight rows with evenly spaced plants. I guess a north south orientation would be idea, but because my neighbors yard is one side and there is a somewhat steeper slope on the other side, I will probably plant east / west. This way I can turn the tractor around in my yard on also on the road. The site drain ok, if this was my real hard core vineyard, I might install some tile to really make it drain well.

Row spacing will most likely once again be 10′ rows with 6′ spacing. I hope to plant 20 rows with 30 plants in a row, I might get 22 rows out of it as I am attempting to purchase the land adjacent to that parcel as well. I ordered 700 plants total, so I have some leeway.

My plans had been to mark the end posts and then my thought has been to get 20 rows of twine and mark with black tape a vine every 6′. Tie the rope to the end post markers and then mark with lime the location of the holes.

That seems fairly time intensive, so I am in the process of identifying other methods. I had planned on disc’ing the field one more time and then broadcast seed the entire plot with a cover crop. Ideally this would be done a year before, but I am doing just 4-6 weeks before planting. Today I learned that once I have the rows marked out, it’s probably best to run the subsoiler down each row and the auger the holes after that. I’ll have to check with my farmer partner to see if that’s feasible, I’d also like to know what other growers have done in the past.

My tools for laying out the vineyard:

TOOLS

For the most accurate layout you will need:

1. A compass: This will allow you to orient the rows with the path of the sun.

2. 300 foot tape measure for measuring the rows, marking your end post and line post installation, setting up your turnarounds.

3. Transit. This is best rented from a rental store. The transit will allow you to make perfectly square fields. It will also enable you to mark the ends of long rows without having to rely on someone holding a string tight.

4. Marking flags. Building supply stores have the flags that are on a foot or so long piece of metal wire. The orange flag is very visible. The flags are used for marking the ends of rows, the line posts, and the turnarounds. It is not necessary to use a flag to mark the location of the vines.

I have never used a transit, nor do I know what one is, so that might pose a problem! I’m still not sure how to mark the location of the vine holes using a transit?

I don’t have to worry too much about favtoring in a radius for tunring the tractor between fields, as 1) I only have one field and 2) I don’t have a tractor yet. However, I my farmer friend has a tractor, so I will stick to 10′ row spacing and allow the minimum 35′ of turning space between the end of the rows and other side of the road / portion of my yard that I don’t want the tractor on.

Here’s another method of laying out the rows which makes sense:

..Rows should be carefully marked to assure that they are parallel along their entire length. This can be accomplished with a tractor mounted pole twice as long as the row spacing. Three marking teeth are attached to the pole, one in the center and one at each end. The tractor is driven along a well-marked base line to start marking rows. Additional rows are marked during consecutive passes by following a previously marked row with an outside tooth. Enough room (30 to 40 feet) should be left at the ends of rows (headlands) for turning equipment….

or

…Alternatively, the vineyard can be laid out with a tape measure(s), marking flags, spray paint or lime to mark the ground, etc.� By choosing a base line (such as a fence or road) the grower can establish a first row.� Each additional row is marked off of this first row.� The 3-4-5 rule (or Right Triangle Rule) is used to make sure that the row ends are marked perpendicular (at a 90Ëš angle) to the first row or base line.� It is very important that a true 90Ëš angle is measured to assure that the rows are spaced properly.� To use the 3-4-5 rule, chose a starting point on the end of the first row (A) Mark a spot 40 feet down the first row (B).� Now mark a spot 30 feet from the original starting point perpendicular to the first row (C) Stretch a tape between the two marks (B & C).� It should be exactly 50 feet. If it is not, adjust the angle from point (A) to point (C) until it is exactly 50 feet from point (B).� Now a line from point (A) through point (C) should be 90Ëš from the base line (A to B) This is easiest done with two 100 foot tape measures.� The process is repeated at the other end of the base row, and possible at intervals along the row if the rows are very long.� If available, a transit can be used to shoot exact angles and help line rows out properly.

I’ve been slowly working on promoting this site. Since I don’t really make any $$ on this site, I don’t allocate many resources to it’s promotion. However, some efforts are being made and those efforts are paying off! I now rank #2 and #4 for the term “Shelton Vineyards” at some point, it’s not impossible that I’ll replace them entirely when people search for them on the Internet. That’s the beauty of the Internet! 500 visitors a day and counting!

But Shelton is just one example, I target all the vineyards and wineries (and hotels and general phrases like North Carolina Wine) quite simply because I want to be the gatekeeper. Someday, once traffic levels are high enough, I’ll redesign the site and make the blog a part of something larger. Maybe an informational guide to all North Carolina wines or maybe the gatekeep will simply direct all traffic to my winery and wineyard? Hmm… I’ll get there, bit by bit, till I own the entire space.

My farmer partner subsoiled my land today. Ideally this is something that would be done in the fall, but I am running behind. Previously the 1.5 acres I bought was planted with oats and fescue, it’s been that way for about 30 years from what I understand. This fall we disc’d the land a couple times and applied a little over a ton of lime to bring up the pH.

Today we subsoiled to a depth of two feet. He’s going to let that sit for a few weeks and then disc it one more time. At that point we plan on using a broadcast sprayer to put down a cover crop. We could use an eight foot seeder, that lays down seed in 7″ rows…but I think because of the high vigor soil, and it’s clay composition, having an under the trellis cover crop might not be a bad thing in the long run. I’d like to introduce some competition for resources to force the root system deeper into the ground.

There’s a decent amount of research being done at the Viriginia Coperative Extension on the use of under trellis cover crops. So we’ll see what happens…my primary concern is the amount of work required to keep the cover crop down (weed whacking) in the first two years of vien growth. I might end up using grow tubes so I can band spary some herbicide immediately under the trellis.

I’ll let you know what I choose as a cover crop, here’s a pic of the farmer subsoiling this morning! If you click on the picture it will being up a bigger picture!

Here’s another image showing the relation of my current vines to the land being subsoiled in the back:

And this image shows the lot I bought to the left, this is where I will be tilling up a large garden and building out a parkling area for people to walk through and view the vineyard!

Preparing for ‘Open That Bottle Night’
Stirs Up Memories; a Chianti’s Odyssey
February 4, 2005; Page W1

The power of wine to create and evoke memories never ceases to astonish us. Just ask Ed Miner of Lakewood, N.Y. It was 35 years ago, at the fabled Oak Room in the Plaza Hotel in New York City. “Clearly out of my league in every way, including price, and desperate to impress my young bride, I fumbled pitiably when asked about wine,” he recalls. “The steward took no outward note of my distress, but said that he had something we might enjoy. He brought back a lovely bottle of Sancerre or Meursault, ceremoniously opened and poured and declared it a gift to celebrate our occasion. I tipped him with my last $5. The memory and my appreciation have lasted 32 years longer than that marriage.”

Memories — making them and reveling in them — is what Open That Bottle Night is all about. OTBN 6 is just around the corner: Saturday, Feb. 26. We created OTBN in 1999 for a simple reason: All of us have that one bottle of wine that is so special to us that we plan to open it on an important occasion, but never do. On OTBN, as a world-wide community, we prepare a special meal, finally open that bottle, and celebrate the memories.

Making Magic

Magical things happen on OTBN. Amanda Heagy of Alexandria, Va., first read about OTBN two years ago. “I thought it was a wonderful idea and decided to have a few friends over so that we could each share our bottles and the stories that went with them,” she told us. “One of my friends thought it would be a nice way to get to know his new roommate if he brought him along. That was the night that John and I first met. We talked all night long. Recently, John and I took our first trip to Napa and Sonoma. During the middle of our trip, while visiting Schramsberg Vineyards, John got down on one knee and asked me to marry him — and I, happily, said yes!”

OTBN has also become a time for family and friends to get together to celebrate friends and family — even family that is far away (see the accompanying listing0).

We believe any night can be Open That Bottle Night. Cherished wines should be opened for no reason at all. One of our favorite scenes in the movie “Sideways” is when wine-loving Miles tells the more-romantic Maya that he is saving a 1961 Chateau Cheval Blanc for a special occasion. She replies: “The day you open a ‘61 Cheval Blanc, that’s the special occasion.” Randy Fish of Spring, Texas, understands that. He bought a special Chianti in Rome in 2001 and planned to open it with his girlfriend on OTBN 4, two years ago. After that relationship soured, he planned to open it on OTBN 5, during the wedding festivities for a friend. But the wedding got in the way, so the next morning they met at the airport to open the wine, but they didn’t have a corkscrew. When Randy traveled to Providence, R.I., to visit those friends recently, they finally opened the bottle. How was it? “Incredible.”

Listen to the wisdom of Paul Marvin of Houston. “While I was at the office late,” he wrote, “my wife had the neighbors over for some pasta. When I arrived home, everyone had gone to bed, but I noticed an open bottle on the counter. I had brought it home after my family had shared bottles from the same case at my brother-in-law’s passing away. It was the bottle of red Italian wine with the sticker on the neck — but I guess I was the only one who knew the sticker meant SAVE PLEASE. At least I had the chance to have a glass alone with his spirit. It just proves what you have said for years: Don’t wait for OTBN. You never know when either you, or that bottle, might be gone.”

Finally, remember that you don’t have to open some cherished old bottle. It’s the memories that count. In 1999, we wrote that the best Zinfandel we’d had in a decade was a 1992 Ravenswood “Dickerson,” which brought a note from Bill Dickerson, who said, in effect, “If you like what Ravenswood does with my grapes, you should taste my own wine.” It turned out that Dr. Dickerson, a psychiatrist, bottled a small amount of wine from his vineyard in Napa under his own label. The next year, we invited Dr. Dickerson to our “Vintners’ Open That Bottle Night” in St. Helena and he brought two amazing Zinfandels: a 1916 from Italian Swiss Colony and a 1947 given to him by Louis Martini. The local newspaper ran a picture the next day of Dr. Dickerson uncorking the 1916 wine with Dottie’s help.

Standing the Test of Time

One of the most remarkable experiences of the following year was finding Dr. Dickerson’s 1989 Ruby Cabernet — a very unusual wine — at Crabtree’s Kittle House, a restaurant in Chappaqua, N.Y. It was delicious and when we called Dr. Dickerson to tell him about it, he was excited to hear how well it had stood the test of time. We became regular correspondents after that. This past Halloween, he sent us pictures of his grandchildren.

On Dec. 26, Dr. Dickerson was killed in the tsunami while he and his wife, Jane, were vacationing in Thailand. She is still missing and presumed dead. When we heard this, we went back to the Kittle House, but it no longer had the Dickerson Vineyard Ruby Cabernet. Instead, we ordered a bottle of 1989 Ravenswood “Dickerson” and it was beautiful, with relaxed, rich fruit, great structure and the elegance of a fine old Bordeaux. Here’s to you, Bill.

So, how do you do OTBN? If you’re planning to open that special old bottle — and, really, if not now, when? — here’s a step-by-step guide:

1. Stand the wine up (away from light and heat, of course) for a few days before you plan to open it — say, on Wednesday, Feb. 23. This will allow the sediment, if there is some, to sink to the bottom.

2. Both reds and whites are often better closer to cellar temperature (around 55 degrees). Don’t overchill the white, and think about putting the red in the refrigerator for an hour or two if you’ve been keeping it in a 70-degree house.

3. With an old bottle, the cork may break easily. The best opener for a cork like that is the one with two prongs, but it requires some skill. You have three weeks to practice using one. Be prepared for the possibility that the cork will fall apart with a regular corkscrew. If that happens, have a carafe and a coffee filter handy. Just pour enough through the coffee filter to catch the cork.

4. Otherwise, do not decant. We’re assuming these are old and fragile wines. Air could quickly dispel what’s left of them.

5. Have a backup wine ready for your special meal, in case your old wine really has gone bad.

6. Serve dinner. Then open the wine and immediately take a sip. If it’s truly bad — we mean vinegar — you will know it right away. But even if the wine doesn’t taste good at first, don’t rush to the sink to pour it out. You never know what might happen, as Bruce Ahler of Viburnum, Mo., discovered recently when visiting some friends in South Africa. “They had a small party one evening and the wine was flowing freely. My friend Jim mentioned a bottle of wine that he had been saving for a ’special occasion’ for years and years. I told him of reading your story of how these old wines should be opened and enjoyed rather than sitting in the cellar until they are forgotten. So this special bottle is produced: a 1976 Simonsig Pinotage. The wine had sort of a murky color and a little sediment. It was tasted almost immediately after pouring and it had a very flat, smoky taste — not undrinkable, but certainly not a good wine. I set the glass aside and after about 15 minutes or so I decided to take another taste. And WOW! The smoky taste was still there, but it had developed into a wonderful, deep and complex, grapey taste. I can honestly say that it was like no wine I have ever tasted.”

7. Talk about the person who gave you the wine, or the circumstances under which you received it. This makes the wine resonate in a very sweet and personal way.

8. Enjoy the wine for what it is, not what it might be or might once have been.

9. Save one last glass in the bottle.

10. After the dishes are done, pour the remainder of the wine into your glasses (you might pour it through the coffee filter if there’s a great deal of sediment, though, personally, we often like the gutsy taste of the wine with the sediment). Then drink up, and enjoy those very last moments of a special night.

11. Drop us a note at wine@wsj.com1 about your evening. If we include your name in our follow-up column, we’ll send you an autographed copy of our book, “Wine for Every Day and Every Occasion: Red, White, and Bubbly to Celebrate the Joy of Living.”
A Family Affair

To the Richman family, Open That Bottle Night is what they call “an East Coast family tradition,” celebrated together — even though Terry and Ted live in Rochester, N.Y., and their daughter, Lisa, lives in Pinehurst, N.C. Here are their stories:

Terry and Ted: Rochester averages around 100 inches of snow each year, and by February everyone is pretty tired of winter. The holidays are past and this occasion gives us something to celebrate — good food, good wine and good friendship. We generally serve dinner at our party and use the evening as an opportunity to invite interesting people we have met during the year and a few old friends. Last year’s menu: fresh spring rolls; curried egg salad (very mild); tuna and peach salsa in endive; marinated asparagus, grape tomatoes and mushrooms; mango chicken; noodle kugel with nuts and raisins; Icewine; pie and coffee.

Last year, we invited guests from all different walks of life. From the first moment, the conversation flowed because everyone has a story and something to talk about. There are always pleasant surprises and often the beginning of wonderful friendships. One couple we have known slightly for some time and would like to know better brought a bottle of Madeira in tribute to the husband’s Portuguese heritage and in homage to the family business, which his brother still runs in Portugal. His wife talked a bit about the family history. This man is charming but unassuming. Without this event, we would never have known about his rich heritage.

It is great fun to plan our mutual OTBN evenings with Lisa, even though she is far away. We trade ideas and successes and feel a little bit closer to each other for it.

Lisa: My parents’ parties sounded like so much fun, and since I have many wine-loving friends, I decided to have my first OTBN party last year.

Now, I will be having one every year just like my folks.

Everyone came in and signed a book with their name and their wine, then they found their wine glass denoted with a personalized wine-glass charm. I chose to have tapas instead of a formal dinner and I used a small bike horn to get everyone’s attention when we took the floor to introduce each wine. There were great stories — one bottle was given to a friend upon his graduation from West Point, and he had moved all over the country with it, just waiting for the perfect opportunity to drink it. I was honored he chose my party after so many years of waiting.

I was not concerned that I already drank my “saved bottle” last year because a friend from the Champagne region of France gave me a bottle of Champagne in June. My friend thought it odd that I would be saving the bottle for the next year and already had a specific date picked out. After I explained the OTBN event, he thought it was a wonderful idea.

I am looking forward to two evenings — mine and my parents’ — of stories, wine, friendship, food and laughter.

It’s great to be back in America! After an eventful six days in France, I can say with absolute certainty that I am happy to be home. Paris was wonderful. Burgundy was incredible. The food was fantastic. The wine was so wickedly sinful that I nare could contain myself. It was all that had been promised and more.

However, it was chilly, it was very expensive, the hotel rooms were small, we both got the flu on our last day in France and then it took us 24 hours to get home, with a myriad of missed flights, crowded airports, coach class seating, lost luggage, car keys in lost luggage and on top of all that were very ill. To finally open the doors to our home was extremely gratifying.

I will be publishing many posts on our learnings about travelling in Europe. We have many more pictures to post and many captions to write. Time is of essence, I understand.

My neighbor, Peter Ness, kindly watches over our house when are gone. I couldn’t ask for a better neighbor. In fact, I am spoiled, as this is my first house and he’s my first neighbor, and as far as neighbor’s go, I don’t think they get much nicer. Hopefully I can repay his kindness when he’s gone, it’s nice to know someone is casting a watchful eve over your house. Thanks Peter, I appreciate it! I did look for your Provence Herb mix, but no luck…hopefully you like the Chardonnay!

Peter took this picture of Villa Kleinheksel from his window, so you can see he has a good view on our house. This is our first measurable snowfall in State Road this year! Now it’s all gone, melted away.