Richard Leroy: Vineyards
Richard brought the care to a halt in the middle of his vineyard, and he and I walked among the 2 hectares of vines in Noëls de Montbenault for a while; the terroir here is metamorphosed sandstone and rhyolite, a durable volcanic rock, the soils themselves soft and crumbly in the hand. Many of the vines are quite young, Richard having replanted about 20% of the vineyard in 2002 in order to replace dead vines. What was there before, however, are considerably older.
Over in the Clos des Rouliers there are 0.7 hectares of vines (so his entire domaine amounts to just 2.7 hectares) planted on a terroir of grey schist, a very friable stone; Richard gave a good demonstration of the differing characteristics of these two rocks later in the day when we returned to his house. The stone-built wall at the front of his property includes these two stones, among many other types. The schist flakes away easily with a rub of the hand, the rhyolite not at all.
The vineyards are planted entirely to Chenin Blanc of course, pruned according to the individual vine in question, with many of Richard’s young vines only giving three bunches and small ones at that, although better established vines may be a little more productive.
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