Night Harvest at Naggiar (Grass Valley/Nevada County): "season off to a late start"

Tony Tibshirani of Naggiar Vineyards in Nevada County, Sierra Foothills, sent these spectacular night harvest photos taken the week of September 25, and an update:

"This season is off to a late start for high elevation growers in Nevada County.  Naggiar's vineyards are at a 1200 ft elevation in the Sierra Foothills, between Grass Valley & Auburn.  

Our Rhone whites are showing exceptional quality.  We’ve harvested Viognier, Marsanne, & Rousanne.  We've seen very little raisining and the yields are somewhat lower than previous years due to the spring rains. We’ve been harvesting around 24 Brix and a pH of 3.5. 

We've also picked our Syrah and Sangiovese, but this next week,  we’ll be focusing on most of our reds."


About Naggiar Vineyards  (from their website)

"After searching for 3 years for a suitable vineyard site, we found a 160 acre site with ideal wine grape growing conditions in the Sierra Foothills between Auburn and Grass Valley. The 160 acre site sits on a large knoll with gentle hillside slopes providing good breezes and air circulation while at the same time reasonable hillside tractor access conditions.  We purchased the land in 1997.

The Nevada County Irrigation canal runs through the site providing an ample and dependable supply of clean water throughout the growing season.  We built a one acre surface area and 20 ft deep pond to ensure that an adequate reserve of water would be available at all times of the year.

The estate vineyards consist of 50 acres planted with 12 different varieties of grapes which provide the flexibility and choice of creating the best varietal wines or the best possible blends."

According to owner Mike Naggiar, the winery made 2600 cases 2010, and they plan to get to 5000 cases.  Their first vintage was 2003, with wines released in 2005.