Our winemaker, Mike Sumner, has the kind of opportunity that winemakers dream about: he’s been starting vineyards and a winery from the ground up, and the 2014 harvest will produce the first Sumner Vineyards wines widely available.
The land that we have been developing is in Trinity County, in Northern California, and the closest town is named Hayfork (if that doesn’t say “agriculture”, we don’t know what does). We started with our 10-acre Olivia vineyard, and we will be planting another 50-65 acres in 2015 at Sky Meadow Ranch. Most of our land is rolling and grassy with old oaks and creeks. In the hills surrounding the valley, tree cover increases into pine and fir forests, gradually rising to the higher mountains of the Trinity Alps.
The land is wild. It’s filled with deer and bobcats, bears and hawks, and at night the only sound is the wind in the trees. It is absolutely beautiful and we intend to keep it that way. As a result, vineyards will be planted around existing meadows and open spaces, preserving the oaks and woodlands.
Our family has a history of working with the land, so we have a realistic point of view when it comes to growing grapes and making wine. Beyond that, it’s exciting to put the pieces of the puzzle together. There’s a real satisfaction in being out in the vineyards, seeing the process from start to finish, and then making wines that everyone can enjoy.
We approach winemaking as an art and a science: We’ve come to believe that winemaking’s an art, because if you’re skillful you’ll produce something beautiful. But winemaking’s also a science, because it requires systematic study and method…so we try to accomplish both.
The challenge of beginning in a fairly new viticultural area is exciting to Mike, and our land has some encouraging qualities.
Our vineyard soils are alluvial, meaning our soil was created by deposits of sediment over long periods of time by the rivers that originate in Shasta-Trinity National Forest. The early Hayfork Valley was subject to floods that left sedimentary deposits behind when the floods receded. This eventually led to the creation of our valley and its meandering creeks.
All out vineyards are situated at an elevation of around 2,300 feet, on level to slight slopes, with full exposure to the southwestern sky. This gives us plenty of heat to ripen fruit, but our nights usually cool down, which allows the fruit to hang a little longer, mature slower…all those things that contribute to higher quality wines.
Stay tuned for more news as our harvest gets closer!
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