Introduction

Mike Weersing

I've been hearing intriguing things about these wines, so this was a good opportunity to try most of the lineup, and to hear a little from the winemaker. As an example of the great press they have been receiving, Jon Bonne wrote the following about the Pyramid Valley Semillon for the San Francisco Chronicle: "Mike Weersing's project is turning out some of the most characterful wines in New Zealand, but even for the staunchly geeky, this Semillon is more an erudite pleasure than anything. But its herbal, mysterious profile was so compelling that I ran out to buy a bunch."

Mike and Claudia Weersing came to New Zealand in 1996, when Mike began making wine with Tim and Judy Finn at Neudorf Vineyards in Nelson. After a lengthy search to find a site for their own vineyard, they purchased a farm in the Pyramid Valley, near Waikari in the Canterbury Hills of New Zealand's South Island, in 2000. Claudia manages the vineyards and is a self described "committed biodynamicist." Mike studied oenology and viticulture in Burgundy, both at the Lycee Viticole in Beaune, and the Universite de Bourgogne in Dijon. He has worked in Europe for Hubert de Montille, Domaine de la Pousse d'Or, and Nicolas Potel in Burgundy; Jean-Michel Deiss and Marc Kreydenweiss in Alsace; and Ernst Loosen in the Mosel. He has made wine in France and in Spain for Randall Grahm of Bonny Doon. He also had apprenticeships with James Halliday at Coldstream Hills in the Yarra Valley of Australia, and with Russ Raney at Evesham Wood in Oregon's Eola Hills. The couple's vineyards have been planted with Pinot Noir and Chardonnay, in clay-limestone soils on scarp slopes, at a density of 10,000 to 12,000 vines per hectare. Ninety-five percent of the vines are ungrafted and Mike claims he has found that those that are grafted onto American roostocks are the first to suffer drought. He also asserts that the roots of the ungrafted vines can penetrate the limestone whereas the grafted ones get to the limestone and stop burrowing down. Mike doesn't worry about the threat of phylloxera, as this vineyard is quite isolated. The part of their vineyard that is planted on a north-facing slope they named Angel Flower, and the site that faces south-east is called Earth Smoke. Both Angel Flower and Earth Smoke are wildflowers commonly found in the area, and the beautifully designed labels feature drawings of both flowers. Angel Flower is actually a yarrow, and the basis of biodynamic preparation 502. The couple also use grapes from sites that they lease and manage themselves, having converted those parcels to biodynamic viticulture.

I came away with a sense that these are unusual wines, and that the California-born-and-raised winemaker is something of a kook, who goes to a great deal of effort (some of it of questionable utility, as in the case of their "vineyard yeast" regime described below) in producing these artisanal creations. He not only follows biodynamic principles, but seems to take some of them a lot further than usual--going way out of his way, for example, to avoid "contamination" of his grapes with ambient yeast in the winemaking facility--he wants to use only the Saccharomyces cerevisiae that happens to find its way to the grapes when they're growing in the field. They attempt to ferment exclusively with yeasts cultured from each source vineyard, by picking a batch of grapes a few weeks early, and letting them begin fermentation in small vats in the vineyard, away from the winemaking facility, to get a "starter culture" going that will then be used to inoculate the rest of the grapes when they are picked. From what I know of winemaking yeast, however, ambient yeasts in the winemaking facility are still very likely to take over and be primarily involved in fermenting the wine to dryness, as studies have shown that there is actually very little of the necessary Saccharomyces cerevisiae, essential to the fermentation of wine, present in any vineyard. Malos are similarly natural, and the wines often ferment for many months. They claim their malos usually require at least a year to complete. Movements of the wine--pressing, topping, racking--are timed to "propitious stages of the lunar calendar." They also use no sulphur at harvest, no enzymes, and no refrigeration or heating, and the grapes are hand destemmed.

What's the result of this meticulous and arguably fussy insistence on extreme biodynamic viticulture and "natural" winemaking? For the details, see my comments on the individual wines below.

Flight 1 - Whites (3 notes)

Flight 2 - Entry-level Pinots (2 notes)

Flight 3 - Top Pinots (2 notes)

Flight 4 - Cab Franc (1 note)