Welcome to the Hafner Vineyard blog. Here, we share what’s happening around the vineyard and winery, along with wine education, helpful wine tips, stories from our patrons, and some of our favorite things to do in Healdsburg and Sonoma County.
We hope you enjoy following along, and if there’s something you’d like to learn more about, we’d love to hear from you.
Send your ideas to kate@hafnervineyard.com
The Press
We always try to do the right thing to leave the planet better than we found it. Since we ship our wine from here to people at home, our wine takes many truck rides around the country, thus emittin...
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Bottling is the process with the most potential waste during the production of wine. We bring in a number of different items and coordinate with numerous suppliers to put our wine into the packagin...
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Every day, no matter what, we stop work at 10am for “Break”. Break is 15 minutes (okay sometimes 20) when everyone at the winery gathers together upstairs in our “break room” for a latte (for those...
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What the heck is “natural beekeeping”?! After a class at Shed in Healdsburg with Ariella Daly, Martin and I were sold on natural and sustainable beekeeping. It takes a holistic and hands off approa...
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One of the dependable aspects of farming is its consistent annual cycles. Every year in late November or early December after the first frost, we begin pruning the grapevines. The vineyard crew hea...
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Harvest is always an exciting time of year, but it can bring anxiety and nervousness. It reminds us that we are at Mother Nature’s will, and this year is no exception. Just before Labor Day, the te...
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As I begin the annual process of self-assessment to renew our Sustainable Certification, it is a time to reflect on all we do to reduce our impact on the environment and to solicit ideas from other...
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Grape Harvesting Machine Video
When people ask me what it’s like to drive the machine harvester, it’s a bit hard to imagine, so we thought it might be fun to have you ride along with me. During the Chardonnay harvest, I wore a G...
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Thinking about selling Hafner wine for 30 years, I recently asked Mom and Dad, "What would you say is our pricing philosophy?" "To make an honest living," Mom said. In a business, core convictions ...
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Our Chardonnay Harvest is a wrap! We started picking on Tuesday, September 6th and finished just four days later. Each day at 4am, the vineyard team and I gathered at our shop, started the machine ...
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Each season in our Alexander Valley vineyard has its own distinct characteristics and color. While most think of Spring as bright and exciting with all of the vineyard’s new growth, it is early Sum...
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A vineyard is always a work in progress. Every block I have ever worked with has had a unique personality. Even two blocks of the same variety planted next to each other are often quite different. ...
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I carry a small vineyard map in my wallet showing each block with its planting dates, rootstocks and clones, so when I walk the vineyard, I know the exact history of each area. We thought it would ...
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This weekend the vineyard colors and sunlight here in Alexander Valley were so striking that I couldn’t resist the opportunity to snap some aerial photos. After Harvest, the vines slowly start to g...
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Benefits of an Estate Vineyard
As all winemakers know, winemaking starts in the vineyard. Having our winery at the southeast corner of our vineyard (30 feet away!) ensures that I’m out in the vineyard frequently. That, in my opi...
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Driving through the Wine Country, you may notice some vineyards are void of any vegetation on the vineyard floor, while others have grass and weeds growing between the rows, and still others are a ...
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From December until March each year, our veteran vineyard crew tackles the tedious and time consuming job of pruning our 80,000 vines. While the vines are dormant, the crew removes most of last yea...
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Looking out over the vineyard from our home, I see Winter asserting its cooling authority and I remember the warm magic of Spring and Summer. How excited all of us were in March and April to see t...
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In addition to the 100 acres we have cultivated to vineyards, we have 150 acres that we have left untouched. Untouched by humans that is…the hillside has become home to numerous species of animals.
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When it comes to picking grapes, harvesting by machine is the best way in my book. It is incredibly efficient because the grapes go from being on the vine to crushed and into a chilled tank within ...
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