2021 Vespidae WV Pinot

Still rivers run deep

A Story: Vespidae (ves-puh-day): Latin name of the wasp family

The Cliff Notes: The color is red garnet. The nose throws red ribbon candy and Christmas spice before delving deeper, coffee, earth, forest floor and black pepper. The attack is more vibrant and red than the nose suggests, all raspberry and cherry Zotz. This red fruit river flows through a primordial canyon of peaches, past beef jerky rapids then tailing out and depositing your palate on a light sand beach.

The Vintage: Overall, 2021 was a reasonably warm growing year yielding a quasi-smallish crop. It started dry, and a historic, late June heat dome pushed temps as high as 114 degrees. We saw some slight leaf burn, but the grapes, lucky to be in green growth, took a ten-day hiatus without too much affect. At harvest we were pleasantly surprised by balanced sugars and acids, plus tasty.

The Building of: Three ton, wild-yeast fermentations in wood and stainless steel, 100% barrel aged for 15 months: 10% new, 29% one year, 61% two year or older. Bottled unfined and unfiltered in December 2022.

Ageability: We absolutely recommend that you consider decanting to get it some air within its first three years. This wine should easily climb in complexity beyond ten years.

Vineyards:This is our flagship bottling representing three great vineyards. In 2021 its lead is our structured and juicy St. Dolores Estate (13 years) at 48%, followed by the lush fruit of holistically farmed Johan Vineyard (20 years) at 29%, and finishing with the linear acid of old-vine Temperance Hill (41 years) at 23%. All our vineyards are dryland farmed.

— Jim Prosser, owner/winemaker