Harvest 2024 at De Wetshof
Despite the Easter weekend falling on earlier dates this year, the De Wetshof cellar team were able to enjoy a welcome respite after the frenetic activities of the harvest season. All the farm’s grapes have been picked and crushed, the wines fermented and placed in their respective vessels for short- to long-term maturation and the aroma of young wines hangs over the winery like a perfumed cloud.
With these young wines being tasted regularly for quality-control purposes, it can be said that vintage 2024 looks set to be an excellent one for De Wetshof Chardonnay with firm, bright acids to maintain freshness and lifting the pronounced fruit-profiles expressing De Wetshof’s site-specific vineyards.
This year’s vintage followed on an unusually wet winter, as well as torrential spring rain in September. De Wetshof experienced 430mm of rain last year, some 130mm more than the average. March last year was a cracker with 131mm falling just as we were wrapping-up the 2023 harvest, and then another 82mm pummeled down in September. There was some flooding of vineyards, but the damage was limited to poles and wiring without serious damage to the plants.
Crucially, these wet conditions experienced last year had a positive effect on the soils, apart from the obvious benefits of getting water down to the deeper-lying vineyard roots. The rain was welcome in flushing-out salts that had over the years accrued beneath the surface, leaving pristine soils that ensured tremendous vineyard health. These healthy vineyards delivered truly fine quality grapes during this year’s harvest, hence the superb status of the young 2024 wines now in cellar. The unwooded Chardonnays are drawing complexity and flavours from the lees, and will be hitting the market at the beginning of June when the merits of this year’s vintage can be tasted.
The Year of the Bateleur
It graces the skies in a unique rocking motion, the eyes on its scarlet facial mask seeking its prey in the valleys, mountains and veld of Southern Africa. This black, white and grey plumed raptor, with the characteristic short tail and orange-red claws, is the magnificent Bateleur (Terathopius ecaudatus), the eagle that has been named by Birdlife South Africa as the country’s Bird of the Year for 2024.
And for wine-lovers around the world, the name Bateleur might also find purchase, as this is the name of the premium Chardonnay made by De Wetshof Estate in Robertson, one of South Africa’s pioneering Chardonnay estates.
It was Danie de Wet who in 1991 as owner-winemaker of De Wetshof made the decision to name the farm’s first bottling of a single-vineyard Chardonnay after the Bateleur eagle – 10 years after De Wetshof had made released its maiden Chardonnay onto the market.
“I had a vineyard planted in 1987 from plant material I propagated from vine-cuttings sourced from the Clos de Mouches vineyard in Burgundy,” recalls Danie. “The 3.5ha vineyard had produced an incredible Chardonnay expressing the distinctive terroir of its site on De Wetshof, and as the wine was maturing in barrel – new wood – I decided that this wine deserved to be bottled under its own label. Problem was, I did not have a name, something that is of vital importance if you as a winemaker and farm-owner want to make a statement.”
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Shining among World Chardonnays
The international wine awards season kicked-off well for De Wetshof, and we hope this success continues over the next nine months. In March De Wetshof was named one of only three South African wineries to achieve a gold medal at the 2024 edition of Chardonnay du Monde in Burgundy, France, with our The Site Chardonnay 2022.
Some 200 wine experts from around the world were involved in the judging of 579 entries comprising various styles of Chardonnay and representing 33 countries, culminating in the awarding of 68 gold medals and 121 silvers.
De Wetshof is honoured to once again be on the podium for this competition, internationally recognised as the ultimate platform of judging the world’s best Chardonnays – at least one of which can be enjoyed on De Wetshof!