Saturday 21 November 2009

Autumn vineyards near Roquessels

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Taken yesterday on a trip to buy wine from Domaine d’Estève, about 7 kilometres away.  It’s still definitely autumn here, with the leaves on the plane trees just turning brown and the temperature up to 16 degrees even on a cloudy day like this.  The vine growers are beginning to prune their vines.  This takes a long time – all winter for those who have large vineyards – as it all must be done by hand with secateurs.

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The vines in the foreground in the pictures above are the ones I photographed last month – here – which have now been pruned ready for next year’s growth.

 

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The dark green foliage on the hillside to the left is mostly evergreen arbutus and holm oak.  There’s some nice old terracing in the photo on the right.  I wish the sun had been shining, but we’re having unusually cloudy weather this week.

4 comments:

syrahsuzie said...

Still lots of colour around Carcassonne too. We had a slight frost one night at the end of October but since then it has been mild so the leaves are hanging on.

This cloudy "marin" weather is getting depressing - it's been going on for ages. The laundry is piling up - too damp to dry it outside and too mild to have the fires going for drying inside overnight!

Still the colours are lovely and we are saving money on the heating.

impoftheyard said...

It's beautiful and colourful even in cloudy conditions. It's great to learn a bit about the vines. We have had virtually continual rain for some weeks now which is a bit depressing - though far more than that for those in the UK who've lost homes and loved ones with the flooding.

Weeping Sore said...

I knew you lived in a lovely place, but seeing the scenery this time of year makes it come alive. Those grape vines look OLD! It's nice to see something that lasts more than a season or two.

Jan said...

Some lovely photos of your surroundings, and gorgeous colours. Yes, pruning them takes a long time - I don't see how they'll ever be able to mechanize it!