The Wines
Spring Seed Wines are made from grapes lovingly grown in our family's organic vineyard, located in the premium wine region of McLaren Vale, South Australia. The vineyard was established in the early 1970's by Peter and Anthea Bosworth, and is now owned and run by their son Joch, who began the conversion to organic viticulture in 1995.Organic farming is based on minimising the use of external inputs, and as such our certified organic grapes are grown and processed without the use of synthetic chemicals, fertilisers, or GMOs.
The Spring Seed Wine labels are unashamedly inspired by vintage flower seed packets created at the turn of the 18th century. The colour, clarity and beauty of the original seed packets are quite remarkable. We chose three different flower images to adorn each one of our McLaren Vale wines, simply because they are quite lovely. The Scarlet Runner Shiraz displays the Hardy and Half Hardy Climbers, Centaurea (Centaurea nervosa) and Zinnia (Zinnia elegans) label.
Vintage 2009
A very dry winter was followed by a hot January which segued into a dry, mild conclusion to vintage. Small crops of both whites and reds were the result of dry conditions in winter and the preceding 3-4 years. In the case of the red varieties, the longer you waited for them the better they got.
Winemaking
We aimed to make a wine without too much oak or winemaking artifice, where the fruit was the main event. As a result, on top of our old-fashioned winemaking techniques, there was more maturation in tank than in oak. In fact we only used about 8% new (French) oak, and only a smattering of big old oak. vessels for this purpose. Grapes were sourced from 3 different adjacent Shiraz block (all certified organic of course) from our vineyard, with most of the batches being open fermented. Yields were low, in the region of 3. 75 tonnesl acre.
Tasting Note
The 2009 Spring Seed 'Scarlet Runner' Shiraz has an impressive nose of rich, dark chocolate (a classically McLaren Vale characteristic), black fruit and cherry ripe. The palate is full and even, with a smoothly approachable tannin structure. Great balance and length make for a wine which is much more than the sum of its parts. In other words, delicious!
Technical Details
| Picking Dates: | 2nd, 11th and 18th March 2009 |
| pH: | 3.48 |
| Total Acidity: | 6.71 g/L |
| Alc/Vol: | 14.5% |
| Bottling Date: | 8 April 2010 |
