Meet Micheal McClendon

Michael worked as a harvest lab technician in 2014 at Pacific Rim, under the tutoring of Lisa Van de Water and keen eye of myself and Anne.

Michael is the co-founder of Sage’s Vintage, a “custom crush” winery and consultancy in Nacogdoches. At Sage’s Vintage, Michael has produced over 80 labels for nearly 30 winery and brand owners. Michael graduated from The University of Texas at Tyler with a B.S. in Biology. His career has taken him all over the world, from Chile to New Zealand, but East Texas still has a special place in his heart. https://www.sagesvintage.com/

Welcome to harvest in Texas, where the constant factor is that nothing’s constant.  This season is marked by several weeks of triple digit temperatures (over 100 F for us or 37 C) which has actually slowed some of the ripening down due to narrow windows where the plants are active.  We started fairly normal with our Blanc du Bois crop from the Gulf Coast region.  We’re seeing a solid bounce back in this variety after the freezes from a couple of years ago that did so much damage to those vines.  We did see a few vineyards bring in small 1st or second year crops with the Andy Walker varieties of Camminarie Noir and Paseante Noir.  These are touted as being resistant to Pierce’s Disease which creates challenges in many growing regions in the state; particularly Gulf Coast, East Texas, and Texoma.  The early looks at the wines yield rustic expressions of fruit, underlying savory and unctuous characteristics, as well as deep color.  It will be interesting to see how these develop over the coming years.  

“Navigating harvest dates on whites like Marsanne and Sauvignon Blanc have made them early stand outs.” 

We were able to preserve some natural acidity which is a plus given many nights were well above 90 F at 9:00 pm.  As the seasons give way to changing air currents the cooling temps are kind of setting the stage for the remaining 60% of the crop to start forming a queue fairly quickly. 

I’m looking forward to Tempranillo, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Viognier to see how far we can push these perennial performers this season.  

Michael C. McClendon