Taken from the Red, White and Green feature by Max Allen

Green Wine – The good Earth

What Lies Beneath

For Jane Wilson and David Lowe at Lowe Family Wines in Mudgee, applying Biodynamic preparations and biodynamic compost to the vineyard is a crucial part of the broader approach to sustainability.

Since its establishment in the mid – 1990s, the dry grown, untrellised Lowe vineyard has been run using very low inputs. Wilson and Lowe moved to organic, biodynamic and biological practices, inspired by the Soil Food Web Institute a few years ago, and have been so impressed they have also decided to wean themselves off copper and sulphur sprays – even though both are allowable (albeit in low doses) as organic inputs – and go completely chemical free.

“This all started because we were chasing that elusive balance of flavor”, Wilson says. “We felt when we were growing conventionally that the grape were fading just before picking – not much, but still the difference between, say, a $30 and a $50 bottle of wine. And when we looked at our soil biology, we found things were good but not complex enough to give full nutrient support to the vine.”

Wilson believes the more biological activity you can encourage under the ground, the more raw materials the vine has to work with, and the more complex and individual the results.

“Our shiraz blocks were originally planted according to soil type”, she says. “We recognized some differences between the blocks very early on, but we couldn’t be sure they weren’t just fermentation or vintage variation”. From 2003 onwards, though, since adopting the organic and biodynamic methods, the blocks have produced distinctly different fruit and wine. “We love chasing that terroir,” says Wilson

Taste the difference

Adherents claim that the fruit from biodynamic vineyards has more distinctive flavor, which flows into the wine and allows it to shine.

2006 Lowe Block 8 Shiraz, $28, and Block 5 Shiraz, $ 40, Mudgee
Two very different expressions of Mudgee shiraz: the Block 8, grown in a mixture of clay and sand, is round, ripe, fuller bodied and more old fashioned Aussie shiraz, while Block 5, grown in sand and shale, is finer, more precise, more spicy and modern.