Seeing red down the valley

You won't find Pohangina Valley Estate wines among the cheapies at your local supermarket. The small Manawatu winery is proud of its boutique product, the owners tell JILL GALLOWAY.

Nick Dymock used to take his spade out when real estate people showed him properties. It was all about finding the right conditions for grapes, but he laughed when, he says, most of them thought he was looking at the worms, and for good soil structure.

Then he found the perfect grape-growing soil at what some would think was a most unlikely spot.

The vineyard is on top of one of the terraces above the Pohangina River.

It is on Valley Rd, on stony soil. Perfect for cool-temperature grape growing.

He talks about the vineyard's winemaker.

The grapes go down to Chris Buring in Martinborough.

"When we first talked to him about making our grapes into wine the first thing he did was grab a handful of grapes, and stuff them in his mouth," says Mr Dymock.

"After tasting them, he said he could make $30-a-bottle wine from them."

The vineyard is co-owned by Nick Dymock, his wife Bronwyn, and her sister Fiona McMorran.

They all have an interest in the grapes, and the resulting wine.

Mr Dymock is the main grape man, arranging pruning, spraying, getting the much needed bird netting on the developing grapes, and the grape pick. Bronwyn and Fiona help out on all aspects of the business, but also focus on the marketing and sales.

The first grapes were planted in 2000, when four hectares were put in.

The spacing is 1.7 metres between plants, and 2.5m between rows. Mr Dymock says he'd now leave an even greater distance between rows.

"I measure the distance between the back wheels on any tractor I might buy. The salesmen are all about horsepower."

It is all about having machinery that fits between the rows of grapevines.

They still have four hectares with 16,000 plants. That's enough for the boutique wine they produce and they have not felt the urge to expand.

The grapes are chardonnay, pinot gris, pinot noir, and a smaller planting of 1000 square metres of their now-famous Pohangina Red grape.

"We'd run out of stock to plant, then a nurseryman gave us what he thought were pinot noir. Once the grapes matured, we saw that the juice was pink – not a pinot noir, and we wondered what the grape was," says Mr Dymock.

"We sent a sample up to a Gisborne laboratory and they didn't know. So we sent the sample to the University of California, in Davis, and they DNA tested it. They couldn't identify it, but thought the parentage was probably French and American," says Ms McMorran.

So with no-one knowing what the grape actually was, "we registered it as Pohangina Red".

The wine made from those grapes is called Totara Reserve after the swimming hole and reserve nearby, she says.

And it has been a winner for them.

"It is a light red, a beaujolais style, a summer picnic wine," says Ms McMorran.

Last year, they marketed it as Totara Reserve and with no advertising, other than word of mouth, the bottles walked off the shelves, she says.

For each bottle sold, $1 is donated to the Manawatu District Council for Totara Reserve, which was heavily damaged in the February 2004 floods.

The floods were not so great for the vineyard either.

"There was a huge lake out where the grapevines are. We weren't sure how the harvest would go," says Mr Dymock.

It was their first pick, after four years of grape-plant growth.

"Actually, it wasn't as bad as we feared it might be," says Mr Dymock.

In those early days, friends and family came to help them pick.

Almost 10 years on from that first planting, the picking and pruning needs a paid workforce.

"Last year we employed 27 people to pick. Local people and students, mainly. As much as possible, we have the same people back, and the local people come back," says Ms McMorran.

Pruning is in June and July, and again the local people usually provide the labour.

"It is better to have people picking, and not a machine. Lots of places have harvesting machines, but people can make decisions," says Mr Dymock.

As well as the grapes, Mr Dymock says they run 250 ewes on their 20 hectares.

"We had good lambing percentage and we're grading up to wiltshires."

They are a self-shedding breed.

"The wool isn't worth much. The wiltshires are clean, with no dags," says Mr Dymock.

The busiest time for sheep management often coincides with a busy period in the vineyard – lambing, dagging, shearing, getting lambs away.

But in the end, the property is all about the vineyard.

"People think you can't grow good grapes in Manawatu. You can. They laugh when they hear we're here," says Mr Dymock.

But they have never regretted buying the property and Mr Dymock says it is a great aspect, with soil that's perfect for grapes.

So although Manawatu is not known as a traditional grape-growing region, that hasn't stopped Pohangina Valley Estate wine from getting international recognition.

Management of the grapesThere are 16,000 plants coming up to 10 years of age.

The grapes flower in December, but are self pollinating and don't need bees.

Pohangina Valley Estate does not thin its grapes as some vineyards do.

"We don't get really high yields; possibly that's due to the odd late frost," says Mr Dymock.

The first yield in 2004 was 1.5 tonnes.

Last summer it was 14.6 tonnes.

The pickers are trained up to pick only selected fruit of good quality. Some vineyards harvest the second flowering grapes – late harvest.

Pohangina Valley Estate doesn't pick them. Instead, the birds and wasps get their share.

The vineyard has 14,500 bottles each year.

Pohangina Valley Estate wine makerChris Buring, from Wairarapa, trained in Australia as a cellar hand at Lindemans in the Barossa Valley in Australia.

Mr Buring then went to University of California, in Davis.

He worked for Paul Masoon (one of 12 biggest vineyards in the US), then went back to Lindemans in Australia and worked there for 25 years.

Mr Buring came to New Zealand in 1989 and worked at Te Kairanga winery in Martinborough.

He has his own winery and brand, as well as making wines from other boutique vineyards.

Mr Buring has made his 45th vintage.

THE AWARDS

The latest is a bronze medal for the Pohangina Valley Estate 2008 Pinot Gris at the Hong Kong International Wine and Spirit Competition.

That comes after two bronze awards at the International Cold Climate Wine Competition in Melbourne in 2006 for the pinot gris and pinot noir.

Of the Hong Kong placing, Mrs Dymock says: "We entered to test their profile in a growing market and to test our wines against others in the world.

"To achieve a bronze in such a big competition against so many entries is thrilling."

There were 1300 wines from all around the world in the competition.

The firm's clear strategy is to stay with quality and remain a boutique winery.

OLIVE TREES

Pohangina Valley Estate also presses and bottles olive oil from the property.

It has 300 olive trees, planted in 2000, and there are five varieties.

Bronwyn Dymock is the olive guru on the property.

The olives are pressed at Otaki. They are harvested in winter, when the grapes are over.

The olives are pressed just as they start to turn black, with about 10 per cent of oil from what is picked.

Pohangina Valley sells 150 bottles, and says the oil is very popular and sells out quickly.

- © Fairfax NZ News