This years Grape harvest was less than usual but the grapes themselves were outstanding.
Here:
PROSSER, Wash. (AP) --Posted by DaveH at November 7, 2003 1:58 PMWine grape growers in Washington harvested less fruit this year than expected, but the smaller quantity means more intense flavors and an exceptional 2003 vintage, growers and winemakers say.
The crop estimate by the Washington Association of Wine Grape Growers for the 2003 growing season was 124,000 tons at the end of July, the highest ever. Harvests, though, have been coming in anywhere from 15 percent to 25 percent below that figure, Executive Director Vicky Scharlau said.
"We knew we would come in shorter than the estimate. We just didn't know how much," Scharlau said. "But that just really focuses the flavor and the taste on the grapes that are there."
Industry leaders said weather was the biggest factor this year: a cooler spring, a scorching summer that kept the berry size down, followed by a spell of warm weather in the autumn that lengthened grapes' hang time on the vine and improved flavor.