Sanguine Estate, Heathcote, Victoria
Viticultural Practices
This vineyard and winery is a family enterprise intent on making concentrated, sophisticated and complex wines inspired by our unique Heathcote terrior, a fault line of ancient Cambrian red rock pulverized over 510 millions years into soil. We have utilized the vertical shoot positioning trellis system to open up the canopy, reduce the risk of disease and expose bunches to direct sunlight for ripening. The vines are cane pruned to a single fruiting wire with a maximum of 20 buds per vine. Crop levels are naturally low and hence bunch thinning is generally not required and irrigation kept to a minimum with some blocks being unirrigated. To conserve the natural balance within the soils and hence the overall health of the vines, we aim to minimize the use of chemicals. In fact, over the past few years, we have managed the vineyard organically by utilizing organic fertilizers and employing other techniques such as mulching to control weed growth. It is our practice to utilize organic principals in the first instance and then if absolutely necessary, use small amounts of chemicals to target specific parts of the vineyard.
Origin of name
Our first wine was already bottled before we discovered our great, great grandfather (Pietro D’Orsa) had planted vines nearby in the late 1800’s. We’ve found six remnant vines and once the origin of these mystery vines are known, we’ll graft a special vineyard from them. In the meantime, we’ve kept aside some exceptional barrels of Shiraz to pay homage to our grand predecessor.
Vintage Overview
Good winter rains followed by better than average spring rains enabled the vines to burst evenly and set a good crop. A warm to hot summer encouraged many winemakers in the region to pick early however a cool March/April meant that we could give our fruit extended hang time for full flavour development without baume levels creeping up too high. The result is richer and more concentrated fruit flavours. The wines from this vintage are proving to be some of the best that we have produced.
Wine Style notes:
All batches are destemmed and lightly crushed and then naturally fermented with wild indigenous yeasts in small open fermenters. At 6 to 8 days, a portion of the wine is transferred to new French oak barriques for barrel fermentation. The remaining wine is kept on skins for an average of 12 days. All wine is moved around the cellars by gravity to avoid pump shock. The D’Orsa was matured in French Oak barriques (60% new) for 24 months.
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