Frost in France, another bad blow

The early start to the vegetative cycle from a precocious spring was once again dealt a heavily damaging frost over the past two evenings in Chablis, the Jura, and the Loire. I have yet to hear from some other areas such as Alsace that were expecting temps of -1 celsius…
Initial reports from Stéphane Tissot in the Jura of 50% losses, from Thomas Pico of Chablis of 40-50% losses.
Unbelievable.
COURAGE AUX VIGNERONS!!!

Bummer, though I am not surprised to hear this. My friends in Munich had a warm spring and then the past few days have been well below freezing. That is a bad combination.

According to Cornelius Dönnhoff there was bad cold/frost (-5 degrees C) in parts of Germany as well.

Jerome Prevost reporting damage in Champagne as well.

So is this terroir, or not? newhere

We are in Burgundy and it’s cold as a mother in law’s kiss tonight. Everyone is a bit edgy.

Here is South Carolina, we lost 90% of the peach crop 2 weeks ago. Same situation, a very warm start to spring, tons of bud break, and then sub freezing temps. Not good.

Spoke with friends this morning in the Valais. Bad freeze there as well after a warm Easter week.

Wink Lorch said this about the Jura

Feel especially bad for those farmers who’ve endured a bad run of late.

German vintners are hit hard. The picture is not complete yet but they face difficult times. Frost over night almost everywhere. And even more frost nights are coming.

Is there a point to this post?

Howard,

He’s making a reference to Tom Hill’s “hail shield” troll post.

I spoke with an Italian chap that said Alto Adige was hit very hard.

Another Champagne producer told me they had frost this morning too. Still assessing the damage.

I’m not as knowledgable about this as others might be - but what frost protection do they use in these regions? Smudge Pots? Fans? Overheard sprinklers?

Cheers.

Larry,

They use various methods trying to protect against frost. . including Smudge Pots and sprinklers, etc. Check out some Facebook pages of the Chablisienne . . .there are numerous eerily pretty pictures of the vineyards at night dotted with Bougies

Cheers, mon ami

HIC

Also frost in Austria :frowning:

I have no info yet if/how much harm has occured to the vines, but we will see …

Our producers in the regions above are reporting damage, as are our winemakers in Irancy, Savoie, Saint Chinian, Beaujolais and Liguria. The only one so far who has said he’s been spared was Clos Massotte in the Roussillon.

In Champagne, most of the Northern Montagne de Reims villages seemed to escape frost damage, but some lower lying, valley type areas were hit. The Ambonnay/Bouzy area was at high risk, but most seemed to pull through okay. The Cote des Blancs was hit hard in the lower valley-type areas with some producers already reporting a 50% loss in some vineyards. Hardest hit has been the Aube where they are suffering just like Chablis. That is the last thing the Aube needed after so many recent years of very low yields.

For those affected by frost, if nothing else goes wrong (no more frost, no hail, no mold problems, etc…) then they will be okay (and natural yield reduction is often a gift), but there is still a month to go in regards to frost risk and something else is bound to happen.

Somewhat interesting is that the blooming started around 2 weeks early in Champagne. Many think that the early maturity of the buds and larger, more numerous leaves than normal may actually have helped things out. Regardless, it is a bit of a shock to walk through the vineyards and see so much vine activity already.