A Harvest Visit to Château Brown, 2012: New Vineyards
Leaving the beehives behind, I walked with Jean-Christophe Mau among the vines and I learnt something of the drastic measures he is undertaking in order to facilitate an expansion of the vineyard at Château Brown. It is a more complex process than you might imagine, and one made more difficult by classic French bureaucracy.
New Vineyards at Château Brown
Although Jean-Christophe Mau owns some fallow land around the vineyard that would be most easily planted, without the need to uproot any trees, it is quality of the terroir rather than ease of planting that is his prime concern. Having inspected the land directly to the west of the château and vineyard, and having taken advice from the internationally renowned soil expert Claude Bourguignon, he purchased 11 hectares of woodland, his intention being to replace trees with vines.
There are two major obstacles for Jean-Christophe to surmount before any work should begin. Firstly, he has had to obtain permission from local authorities to uproot the trees. This process is underway, and although permission is likely to be granted it will most probably come with the condition that more trees are planted elsewhere on the estate. This shouldn’t be a problem, because as I have indicated above there are some peripheral low-lying zones, with less adequate drainage and more sandy soils, where Jean-Christophe has no desire to plant vines. These areas will be ideal for the planting of trees, and in order to further increase the biodiversity around the vineyard there are also plans for 2 kilometres of hedges.
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