The valiant effort to save the blackberries continues.  Here are a few pictures of the “protection” process that took place over the weekend.  It seems like a simple process to drape a 15 foot wide cloth over a 100 foot long row of berries, especially thornless berries.  Apparently,  Mother Nature thought differently as she sent 5-10mph breezes wafting across the field and whipped the covering 15 feet into the air.  But, Upper Management and Worker Bee fought it out with her for several hours and persevered.  (thanks to a few leftover vineyard posts)  By the end of the day, 6 rows of berries had been saved.  The big question now is, “Is Mother Nature done?  Or will the cold weather return?”  Stay tuned for further updates in this ongoing saga.

In other news, Worker Bee and her posse continue to remove the old vineyard posts and re-attached the wires to the new posts.  Progress is slow due to spring rains and muddy fields.  With the addition of new help, the goal is to have the wires in the vineyard attached to the new endposts before the vines start to bud out.  But, pruning cannot start until the post project has been completed.

The recent 60 and 70 degree weather has been superb and lots of green things are starting to pop at the winery.  Stop by to see all the green shoots popping out on the Blackberries.  Due to the potential for colder temps, we’ll be covering a few rows this weekend and keeping out fingers crossed that we can ward off the potential frost damage.  We want to make a blackberry wine (with our berries) this year.

We’re still taking entries for the 2016 T-shirt contest.  Only 3 weeks left to get your entries in.  No need to be an artist.  Just give us the concept and a hand drawn sketch.  Our graphic artist can make the winning entry pretty.  Stop by the winery to pick up an entry form or download a copy here.

 T-shirt contest 2016

And for those of you who scrolled past the T-shirt entry form, here’s a few pictures of our recent construction project.  Stop by the winery and we’ll tell you all about it.  More pics of the construction project to follow over the next few months.