Shaky Bridge Wines

The Shaky Bridge Vineyards

Shaky Bridge Wines are sourced from some of the oldest vines in Central Otago and from several different vineyard sites within the Alexandra Basin. These include:

Home Block - all five varieties we grow are planted here
The Fan - this is a small Pinot Noir only vineyard
Airport Block - another Pinot Noir only block
Pioneer Vineyard - a 20HA block planted to Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris and Gewurztraminer
Shaky Bridge Vineyard - by the Shaky Bridge itself, this is a small Pinot Noir only vineyard
Terrace Vineyard - new to us in 2011, this is a 16HA vineyard planted to Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris in Earnscleugh

Our Growing Environment
Alexandra is a starkly beautiful, rugged land, with large schist outcrops covering the mountains and wild thyme blanketing the foothills. Over a period of nearly 40 years, we have tested and selected prime sites within the Alexandra Basin to plant our vineyards.

With north facing sites containing free draining, predominantly deep alluvial gravel soils, our vines develop deep root structures in search of water during the intense heat of a Central Otago summer. Central Otago is New Zealand's highest and the world's most southern wine growing region. The mean sunshine hours of the Alexandra Sub-Region are 2050 hours per annum providing 900-1200 'growing degree days'; heaps of important sunshine to grow healthy vines and fully ripe grapes.

Rainfall of only 250-300mm (9.84-12 inches) per annum combined with our long dry autumns of warm days and cool nights, allows us to take advantage of 'hangtime' to slowly ripen our fruit. This creates intense flavor from superior quality grapes.

Sustainability
New Zealand enjoys international fame for its stunning, unspoiled landscapes. New Zealand's small population, isolated location and agricultural economy have earned the country a "clean, green" image.
New Zealand grape growers and winemakers aim to keep it that way by protecting the environmental integrity of their wine production. To this end a pioneering set of industry standards, Sustainable Winegrowing New Zealand (SWNZ), have been developed.

Sustainable Winegrowing New Zealand provides the framework for companies to continually work towards improving all aspects of their performance in terms of environmental, social and economic sustainability in both the vineyard and the winery. The introduction of a winery program in 2002 has been a significant development.

Provide a "best practice" model of environmental practices in the vineyard and winery.
Guarantee better quality assurance from the vineyard through to the bottle.
Address consumer concerns in matters pertaining to the environment and winegrape production.

Our vineyards are certified sustainable by SWNZ

General Philosophy

Parcel selection allows our winemakers to create multi-dimensional wines of the highest quality. Expressing the flavours and distinctive character of this region is what we strive for. The philosophy is simple: let the land speak for itself. The goal is always to produce the highest quality wine that nature allows us to create; though we do have to disagree/fight with nature from time to time in order to ensure what we do grow is the best it can be!

Clonal Selection

After numerous trials, our Pinot Noir clones include 5, 6, 115, 667, 777. Clones are grafted onto selected rootstocks to encourage maximum ripeness including 101-14 and Schwarzman. Some of the original 25+ year old vines in the Home Block are still planted on original rootstock.

Yield and Quality Management

We manage our Pinot Noir vines to achieve a yield of no more than 5 tonnes per hectare; just a couple of tons per acre! Owning our own vineyards, and managing our source vineyards, allows us total control over grape quality.

Vineyard Management

When we planted our first vines in 1973, the challenge was to select the best varieties for our extreme weather and soils. We chose grape varieties most suited to the region including Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Gewurztraminer, Pinot Gris and Riesling.

Now synonymous with Central Otago, Pinot Noir is the only variety planted in the Airport, The Fan and Shaky Bridge vineyards. We have some younger Pinot Noir planted in our largest vineyard, Pioneer; the source block for our Pioneer Series collection of wines. These sites, along with the original Home Block vineyard, each have a unique microclimate and soil composition, imparting their own flavor characteristics to our wines. The Home Block is 'home' to all five varieties we grow. We grow Pinot Gris and Gewurztraminer alongside Pinot Noir in the Pioneer Vineyard.

We use the latest viticulture techniques tailored for our unique region to produce our premium quality wines; these include irrigation monitoring and scheduling, temperature sensors, canopy management and dedicated frost fighting systems.

Many of the practices we use in the vineyard are 'hands on' with little mechanical involvement. Pruning and harvest are all carried out by hand.

Vertical Shoot Positioning (VSP) and Canopy Management

This long established system trains the fruiting shoots upward from the vine trunk. Trellis wires, creating a vine row that can look more like a landscape hedge than a vine, support the shoots and allow us to control the amount of direct sunlight through ! All our vines are hand pruned using cane or spur pruning.

Irrigation monitoring

During the extreme conditions of the dry summer months we employ trickle irrigation. Using the latest technology in soil moisture measurement and management, TDR probes are installed at various vineyard locations. These measure the soil moisture from the surface down to 1.2 metres allowing for precise and targeted irrigation. This also helps us to control vine vigour; the amount of green foliage the vine produces. We want our vines concentrating on their real job of making great grapes and not getting sidetracked with the green stuff.

Vine Management

Bud rubbing is carried out in the Spring to remove unwanted shoots from the base of the vine so that any fruit is grown high up the vine where the most sunshine is. We carry out leaf removal/leaf plucking to improve airflow through the canopy and to provide better fruit exposure and reduce shading. We also remove any laterals at this time to reduce any second set fruit and to further open up the canopy. Straightening shoots helps optimize cane spacing and reduces crowding.
We use bunch counts after fruit set and average bunch weights for each block to estimate harvest yields each year. We drop fruit, when necessary, in order to manage to our preferred yield quantities. We believe that low yielding grapevines grown in our region are a very necessary part of what makes our wines unique.

Frost Fighting

Frost is just one of the climatic influences we need to deal with in Central Otago each year. Frosts can devastate our vintage at the beginning of the vine growing cycle or just prior to harvest. We employ overhead impact sprinklers to help us keep the frosts at bay. As water is sprayed through the vineyard, cold temperatures freeze the water on the vine. The freezing process creates enough 'heat' to ensure the vine temperature does not go below zero degrees, creating an 'ice shell' of protection around the vine. Sounds weird, but it sure works! Our clonal selections, for example clones with later bud burst, late pruning and inter-row management also help us avoid frost damage.