Wine Closure ‘Wars’

Over the years on this blog I have discussed wine closures quite often ie. cork v screw caps.
Because of the high incidence wine spoilage problems associated with cork ie. ‘corking’ caused by TCA ( 2,4,6-trichloroanisole) contamination, the balance has always leant heavily towards screw caps.
Australia was one of the first countries to embrace this technology, first mainly with white wine, then with reds even including expensive top of the range.
It is estimated that around 90% of Australian wine utilizes screw caps.
Other wine producing regions in Europe and the USA were slow on the uptake, even dismissive.
But that has changed considerably over the years. Some imported wine eg. Italian, still use them. Very little French wine in the price bracket I buy in has cork.
Obviously this trend has hit the cork producing countries eg. Portugal, very hard.
And they are fighting back.
I became aware of this when the daughter living in the USA sent me a picture of a bottle of South African wine they were drinking which had a cork twist top closure.
I had never seen one before and did some research.
Obviously I am little behind the times.
The “Helix” cork was developed by the Portuguese cork giant Amorim and is “screw cork” or resealable cork. In practice, these corks are similar to the corks you might find in the top of a whisky bottle as they can be taken out and put back in repeatedly without much effort. But what makes the “Helix” unique is that the cork requires a special bottle with a threaded neck. Matching ridges in the cork allow it to be twisted back into the bottle for an airtight seal after opening. But the “Helix” innovation isn’t new. In fact, Sonoma’s Red Truck Wines became the first U.S. winery to start using the twistable cork way back in 2016. So its rarity in the market place may reflect the uptake of the technology.

Who would be clamouring for a screwcap-cork hybrid?
Probably the biggest argument in support of cork is that it’s supposedly better for aging wine.
However the AWRI (Australian Wine Research Institute) has not examined this specific issue over the longer term but anecdotal observations indicate that red wines develop in much the same manner when sealed with screw caps as they do when sealed with well-performing corks. There are numerous red wines from Australia and New Zealand from early 2000s vintages onwards sealed with screw caps, which invariably demonstrate that this is the case.
There is also the ritual of uncorking the bottle, and the “pop” heard as the cork is released. This was, in the past, considered parts of the wine experience.
The “Helix”does this too.
But is this still part of the wine experience?
I don’t think it is any more, in this part of world anyway.
But more importantly Amorim has achieved a major technological breakthrough to become the world’s first cork producer to deliver natural cork stoppers to winemakers with a non-detectable TCA guarantee*
Known as NDtech, the technology greatly enhances Amorim’s quality control measures by screening individual cork stoppers on the production line to eliminate the risk of corks contaminated with 2,4,6-trichloroanisole reaching winemakers.
Two of the world’s leading wine industry research facilities, Hochschule Geisenheim University and The Australian Wine Research Institute (AWRI) have been engaged to independently validate the performance of NDtech.
Australian wineries are among the first to be offered corks that have undergone NDtech screening.
Will this all mean a huge resurgence of the cork closure?
I doubt it.

* A non-detectable TCA guarantee means that if any TCA remains in a cork it is below the detection threshold of 0.5 nanograms/litre.

Our Hydrangeas Are Not Blue

The hydrangeas outside the ‘little house’ (studio) were a mess.
Due to neglect by the resident horticulturalist, they had become tall and straggly. Under pressure from the co driver I gave them a real good haircut, almost a buzz cut, last autumn and this season they have come back bushy and flowering like crazy.

But how come the flowers are pink?

The pH of our soil is around 4.5 ie. acidic which means they should be the more desirable blue. 

Some are trying to be.
The pH scale ranges from 0 to 14. Acid soils have a pH of 6.5 or less. A pH of 7 is neutral. Alkaline soils have a pH of 7.5 or more.
Hydrangeas grow best in soil that has a pH of 5.2-5.5. The soil element that turns hydrangeas blue, is Aluminium. At low pH if Aluminium is in the soil it becomes soluble and more ‘available’ to plants even possibly to the point of being toxic.

Aluminium is typically present in ironstone rich soils and those in which the dominant clay mineral is kaolinite. Sandy soils like ours contain little aluminium so while being strongly acidic, there is little influence on turning the flower colour to blue.
Maybe we could add Aluminium sulphate to the soil but that seems a bit OTT when we are happy with the colour the flowers are.

Another Annoying Weed / Fleabane

We have been inundated with a newish weed, fleabane (Conya spp).
Originally from America, fleabane is usually found invading disturbed sites, bushland edges and roadsides and can tolerate poorly drained areas. But it’s in our pasture and wooded bush land.

There are seven fleabane species naturalised in Australia
Among these species, flaxleaf fleabane, tall fleabane and Canadian fleabane are the three most common, with flax leaf predominant.
They are annual herbs growing up to 2 m in height which form a rosettes first and then erect stems.
Leaves are generally soft, hairy and coarsely toothed with a single stemmed flower stalk with flowering heads. 

Flower heads are fluffy and white around 1 cm wide and seeds are achenes (a hard dry fruit containing a single seed) approximately 5 mm long with a tuft of fine hairs.

Flowers appear in summer followed quickly by seeds which are dispersed by wind and water run off.
Suggested control measures are bagging seed heads and removing them from site and pulling smaller plants or digging out tap root.
Both these are impractical on large properties.

We have resorted to spot spraying with good old glyphosate despite confirmed resistance of the weed to this herbicide.
‘Our’ weeds succumb in two to three days.

This process is a little tedious but good exercise.

Fleabane will reshoot and germinate after fire so follow up is required where seed may have been left in the soil.
This has been the cause of our (and many other properties) problem, even two years after the fires.
Am sure we will have to do more than one pass to get them all.

Australia / Severe Weather Warnings / Flooding

Virtually the whole country is today under weather warnings, many places for severe conditions and possible flooding.

It’s been raining here for a week and it looks like it may get worse.

We don’t need anymore rain thanks.

Temperatures for November have been very low also.

Most unusual.

Renew/Repair of Cattle Yards

The previous owner of our property was in the timber business.

In fact, he had a mill which has since been turned into a very nice guesthouse. It is now on another part of the place as the original property has been sub divided.

So when it came to anything wooden, only the best and strongest was ever used.

This is reflected in many of the long standing strainers and posts used in the fencing but more particularly in the cattle yards, race and loading ramp. The posts and rails and other infrastructure are highest quality.

After 30 years of residence here it was time for me to look at this as weather, soil moisture and white ants had started to take their toll.

I don’t use the race and ramp at all but the yards do come in handy at times.

So I ordered a whole array of posts and rails to do the necessary repair and renew work of the complete complex.

My friend, Stirls offered to help.

Over five days we got the work done, even revamping and repairing the ramp and race.

It’ll probably see me out now. 

COVID-19 / New South Wales / 2nd November Update

It is obvious that our state, New South Wales, is progressing to opening up faster, due to our vaccination rates, than other states so will concentrate on that situation more in the future.
In NSW 93.7% of people eligible have now had at least one dose of the vaccine, while 88.3% are fully vaccinated.

Today the New South Wales government has brought forward, to the 8th November, a raft of freedoms for fully vaccinated residents, while delaying when unvaccinated people can exit stay-at-home orders.
Under the original roadmap, restrictions were supposed to ease from 1st December. 

The NSW premier said today’s changes were due to the state’s high vaccination rate, with authorities pushing NSW to hit 95% double dose coverage.

The changes also delay the mooted 1st December restrictions ease for unvaccinated people to either when the state hits the 95% fully vaccinated rate or by 15th December, whichever occurs first. 

Obviously this will cause some disquiet among the anti vax crowd but who cares. Their selfishness shouldn’t be rewarded.
The mask mandate will also remain until the state hits 95% fully vaccinated or 15th December.

In other news the NSW international border is open to fully vaxed people who can now arrive without quarantine and depart without ‘permission’.

There have been some pretty emotional scenes at Sydney airport as families reunite, some after nearly two years separation.

Our 2022 USA trip plans are back on the table.
Also everyone is now eligible for a Pfizer booster shot 6 months after their last inoculation no matter the initial vaccine taken.

So it’s certainly all happening!