Loire 2020: The Flowering
The weather during what remained of spring followed winter’s lead, being on the whole rather mild, with some no shortage of rain. This inevitably raises the possibility of mildew, but Loire Valley vignerons are used to these conditions and to being proactive with treatments (I do sometimes wonder when I read of others regions hit by a wave of ‘devastating’ mildew how much better the outcome might have been had the chef de culture been trained in Amboise or Montreuil-Bellay rather than Bordeaux or Dijon). As a consequence, mildew was not a big concern in 2020.
With this mild weather persisting the vines held onto their advantage, the flowering arriving in the Nantais on or about May 18th, still three weeks ahead of schedule. The floraison in the Central Vineyards followed suit, just a few days later. Although the weather was a little damp and changeable (unlike their counterparts in Bordeaux, the Loire Valley vignerons do not profess to have had a ‘magic week’ of perfectly warm and dry weather for the flowering) the floraison seems to have progressed pretty well.
Through June there was still some rain, and sadly some vineyards in the Côte d’Auvergne were hit by hail. But the on-off precipitation finally came to an end, and with the arrival of July the region entered a long period of warm drought.
Summer
It is quite straightforward to summarise the weather during July and much of August; it was very dry, and very warm. It was not a torrid heatwave like 2003, which saw spikes of extreme temperatures, but was a more stable and consistent pattern of high temperatures and very little rainfall. The conditions were good for organic or biodynamic growers, and indeed for anyone trying to reduce their use of chemicals – “we used 50% fewer treatments than usual”, says Pascal Jolivet, whose domaine is mostly organic – but it did also cause some problems.
