Plants I'm Growing: From the garden

From the garden today: Several kinds of tomatoes (Black Krim, Better Boy, Sungold), "Gypsy" sweet peppers, jalapeño peppers, Poblano peppers, Swiss chard, chingensai, zuchini, and cucumbers. 

Wines I'm Making: 2024 Harvest

Harvest 2024: I'm not entirely sure why, but our grapes this year suffered badly from damage by yellow jackets. They pierce the berries and can remarkably quickly suck a berry completely dry. This was the smallest harvest from our little backyard vineyard in the 21 years I've been making wine from it. Given that we're running out of room to store wine and we can't drink it fast enough to keep it from accumulating, perhaps an occasional small harvest is a good thing. 

I picked the grapes on Friday, October 10th. We got only 34.75kg (76.45lbs) of Cabernet grapes and 8.44kg (18.6lbs) of Sangiovese grapes – which is about half or less than half of what we usually get. That will yield only about 32 bottles. Normally we get 75 bottles or more. Because of.a couple of spells of very hot weather, the grapes were sweeter than they usually are at harvest, but partially because of desiccation. 

The Cabernet measured at 25.3º Brix. About 24º Brix is ideal for the style of red wine I like. More sugar means more alcohol. Too much sugar results in a hot, unbalanced wine. So, for the first time since we started making wine here in 2004, I reduced the sugar level slightly, to 24º Brix by adding 1l of acidulated distilled water (adding 7g of tartaric acid/l). After a three-day cold soak, I inoculated the must with Rockpile yeast. The fermentation is now well underway. 

The Sangiovese was pressed after 12 hours on the skins to make a rosé. The Sangiovese grapes measured at 23º Brix, which is perfect for a rosé. Normally, if anything, I have to slightly adjust the sugar level in the Sangiovese grapes upward. This year I made no adjustment. The Sangiovese, too, is fermenting, but there will be only enough to make about 7 bottles of finished wine. Normally we make about 15 bottles of rosé each year. 

Art I'm Making: Untitled Collage No. 295 (Santa Rosa)

With Art Trails, Sonoma County's premier juried open studios event, coming up next weekend (October 19–20) and the following weekend (October 26–27), here's another collage from earlier this year. This is Untitled Collage No. 295 (Santa Rosa), completed May 18, 2024. Image size 25.5cm x 16.6cm (10.0 x 6.5 inches). Signed on the mat. Signed and dated on the reverse.

Click on the image for a larger view. For more of my abstract monotype collage work, visit my website at http://ctalcroft.wix.com/collage-site/ or you can purchase my recently published book commemorating ten years of working in the collage medium – Colin Talcroft: Abstract Monotype Collage: 2103–2023 (ISBN 979-8-218-37717-5). Available on the website. 

In person, my work can be seen at Calabi Gallery in Santa Rosa, Hammerfriar Gallery in Healdsburg, and at the Ren Brown Collection in Bodega Bay. Better yet, visit me during Art Trails, which, as noted above, will be October 19–20 and October 26–27 this year. This year, I'll be Studio 40. Studios are open 10AM to 5PM all four days. Hope to see you in the studio!

Rain: First rain of the 2024-2025 rain season

The forecast called for light rain in the morning of October 12 with a 35% chance of rain. It did rain, but it ended up raining pretty much all day, which was a welcome surprise. The rain was indeed very light – a mist most of the day – but we got maybe a tenth of an inch. I didn't have the rain gauge out yet, but any amount of rain is welcome at this time of the year.