Almarla Vineyards

[gaudet]

I'll be leaving in 1/2 an hour to visit this place in Mississippi. They grow muscadines strictly for juice. I know and work with the owners mother. Talking with him, he used to be a vintner and he said he would be happy for me to come out and give me some wisdom on how he made muscadine wines as well as give me a bunch of grapes. If I can find the camera, I will post pictures tonight or tomorrow. Its a 3 hour drive from my house, so I got a long haul. I'm sure it will be "fruitful"

 

[Waldo]

Looking forward to the post on your trip gaudet

 

[Bert]

WE are still wondering how things went???..lol.....Hope it was fun..

 

[gaudet]

I got 2 48 quart ice chests full of carlos muscadines. I also got 3-5 gallon buckets full of em as well. Tim was a great guy. He talked about getting back into wine making in the near future. He just needed to get the winery back in working order since they haven't produce wine in quite some time.

Right now I've been cleaning grapes and picking out the stems and leaves since we used the harvester and not hand picked them. I haven't even gotten through one ice chest yet and I am going to work at it till I pass out tired. I will post some pics tomorrow. Tim showed me how to drive the harvester and let me drive it. That was one behemoth of a tractor.

 

[gaudet]

Ok, I am almost done processing the grapes. Geez, at this point I have 19 1 gallon bags stuffed full of Carlos Muscadines. Talk about the labor of your fruits....................

Here are the pictures as promised. There are 21 of em, so this is going to be big.

The first three are shots of Tim's back yard at the vineyard. Man thats a view I could wake up to every morning.

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These three are just general shots around the vineyard.

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More shots overlooking the fields at the vineyard.

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Tim on the harvester and some shots from up above

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A few more shots while we were running the harvester. Really neat machine.

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Yes I was driving it.......... That was cool. And no I didn't wreck it. I drove so slow I saw some snails on the ground passing me

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A few final shots of the harvester close up. The beaters drop the fruit which is collected below the vines and carried up a chute via conveyor belt. When there is enough fruit in the bottom, they load it into buckets. The last shot is of some wine storage tanks. Tim said they were operational, but empty at this time.

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Tim was a great host, he was happy to have me there. We sampled a bottle of wine made from his grapes from a vintner out of Florida. It was some pretty good stuff. He also gave be a gallon sample of straight muscadine juice. That stuff is great.

I have to laugh, cause he said he might call me next September to drive the harvester.................

 

[gaudet]

Here is a slide show for those that want a closer view

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Edited by: gaudet

 

[NorthernWinos]

What kind of grapes were you harvesting??? Mucadines???

 

[gaudet]

Yes,

Carlos variety...........

 

[NorthernWinos]

I know nothing about Mucadines, but thought they ripen unevenly.....

Do the Carlos all ripen at the same time so they can mechanical harvest????

I loved the slideshow.
Edited by: Northern Winos

 

[gaudet]

I think they do ripen fairly uniformly. Though I am not positive about that. I will find out in the future cause I ordered 4 vines to plant in the next season. I ordered two Ison variety, 1 carlos variety, and 1 dixie red variety. I plan on a very small vineyard in the back of my yard. Two forty foot runs of vines, not sure how I will position them yet, but its in the planning stages.

 

[gaudet]

Finally done with those pesky grapes

Grand total of 21 gallon bags full to the brim. I guess the bags are about 4-5 pounds each. I will have to weigh them before use so I know how much I have used, but if I am correct on the average weight then I guess I should be able to get at least 3 batches at 5-6 gallons from this reaping.

 

[smurfe]

I think they do ripen fairly uniformly. Though I am not positive about that. I will find out in the future cause I ordered 4 vines to plant in the next season. I ordered two Ison variety, 1 carlos variety, and 1 dixie red variety. I plan on a very small vineyard in the back of my yard. Two forty foot runs of vines, not sure how I will position them yet, but its in the planning stages.

Have you ordered the vines already? If not, when you make your order pick up their book on growing Muscadines. It is absolutely invaluable and packed full of great info. It was written for people like us. It will answer just about any growing question you will have as well as give you a great history lesson on the Muscadine.

 

[gaudet]

I will have to add that to my order. I already ordered the vines which won't ship out until December. Thanks Smurfe

 

[mississippi mud]

qaudet, where is this place? I probably missed it skipping though the post.

 

[gaudet]

Shubuta, Mississippi, about 40 miles NE of Laurel.......

 

[gaudet]

Finally done with those pesky grapes

Grand total of 21 gallon bags full to the brim. I guess the bags are about 4-5 pounds each. I will have to weigh them before use so I know how much I have used, but if I am correct on the average weight then I guess I should be able to get at least 3 batches at 5-6 gallons from this reaping.

The gallon bags actually weighed between 6-7#'s each