Does "late harvest" equal Botrytis?

Late harvest can be botrytis, in varying degrees. Muller's 89 Auslese has strong botrytis.

You are askng many questions, and we dont mind answering if we can, but you give the impression of making others do your work, nit unlike some pas notable posters.

Mike

Mike Tommasi, Six Fours, France email link

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No, late harvest means just that: grapes harvested somewhere on the path to becoming raisins (in the case of Recioto, perhaps all the way there). It is certainly possible that they become botrytized, but that is a separate issue. For instance, late harvest reds have never in my experience had any botrytis character.

Mark Lipton

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Salut/Hi Leo Bueno,

le/on Mon, 13 Sep 2004 10:58:40 GMT, tu disais/you said:-

Fungus. Sorry to nit pick, but there's a host of difference.

I think it's half a dozen and six of the other.

Botrytis requires moisture; ideally dew or misty mornings, with beautiful sunny afternoons to make sure that moisture doesn't rot the grapes (becoming 'grey' rot which is not good). Red wine regions, eg most of Italy, Spain, Australia are hot. The grapes usually have thick(er) skins than white grapes because they have to. Both these factors are not conducive to botrytis. Hence the variations on the basic passito method (drying grapes by various methods) is the norm for dessert wines in Italy for example. There's few places in the world that can *consistently* obtain Botrytis wines. Even the Loire, Sauternes, Tokaji, have 2, 3 even 4 vintages per decade without significant botrytis. Eg the much 2003 Sauternes might very well be great but will not be characterized by botrytis.

Peter

Also, remember Botrytis can appear where it is unwanted! It may be a "feature" of some wines, but many growers would regard it as an unwelcome disease.

In Germany, "late harvest" would be translated to "Spätlese", and typically would not have noble rot. Normally you would have to go the the Auslese levels to get Botrytis.

"Leo Bueno" skrev i melding news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

Ice wine (made from frozen grapes) is a different animal. Late harvest needs to be defined in order to answer your question. We are talking about very ripe grapes, i.e. with a high sugar content. How high will depend on climate and growing season, so a late harvest German wine is not the same as a Californian one. Germans classify their wines on basis of juice sugar content alone and in order to reach the highest levels of Beerenauslese and Trockenbeerenauslese botrytis is *necessary*. The Auslese is technically late harvest too, most often without botrytis, but not with a sugar level remotely approaching what can be found in hotter climates. Thus a sweet Auslese will only have 8% alcohol.

On the other hand, in hot places like California or Greece, the grapes will easily become superripe and rich in sugar without needing botrytis to boost the juice. Anders

As Mark L. already said, "late harvest" means just that and nothing more; neither Botrytis nor freezing necessarily involved, just very ripe grapes that might or might not have their sugar content further enhanced by dehydration.

- Mark W.