Our Vineyard .... 

Our Whicher Ridge property is located in Chapman Hill, south of Busselton in Western Australia, on the north facing slopes of the Whicher Range. Click here to view the Google Map of our vineyard.

John Gladstones, a highly regarded Australian viticultural scientist, stated in 1992:

"Chapman('s) Hill ... on the lower northern slopes of the Whicher Range, south of Busselton, have suitably gravelly soils, temperatures and sunshine hours for full bodied table wines ... The area is in the rain shadows of both the Leeuwin-Naturaliste Ridge to the west and the Whicher Range to the south, and is therefore warm, dry and sunny like the coastal plain. The particular environment of the slopes and gravelly soils might ... be classified with ... Margaret River in its broad sense. The region ... equates to warmer parts of Bordeaux with more rain in winter, and less rain, together with more sunshine in summer..."

We planted our 5 hectare Whicher Ridge vineyard in two stages. The sauvignon blanc was planted in 2004, with the viognier, petit verdot and cabernet sauvignon planted in 2005.

Vineyard Stats:

* Vine spacing is 2 metres, row spacing is 3 metres

* Total number of vines in vineyard is 10,000

* 2.5 ha sauvignon blanc, 0.6 ha viognier & 1.9 ha cabernet sauvignon

* Sauvignon blanc vines trained on double cordon wire

*Cabernet sauvignon & viognier trained on single cordon wire

* Vine canopies are managed using vertical shoot positioning

* Vines are pruned using cane & spur pruning methods

We have followed sustainable grape growing practices from the first day that we started ripping the rows and planting the vine rootlings. We use an integrated pest management (IPM) program for managing grapevine pests and diseases in our vineyard. the aim of our IPM system is to reduce our overall use of chemicals, and ideally, to eliminate the use of some chemicals altogether. We do not use any pesticides in our vineyard, and we have a very healthy and numerous resident spider population as a result.

Healthy vines grow in healthy soil, and we have adopted many practices such as undervine mulching to encourage work activity, and limiting the use of our tractor in the mid rows to minimise the long term damage to soil structure due to compaction.

We are extremely lucky to be part of the home range of a huge, and very noisy, flock of yellow tailed black cockatoos, and a smaller family of red tailed black cockatoos. These birds are listed as endangered in Western Australia, and one of their remaining strongholds is here in the South West.

Our vineyard block sits in the middle of our property, and we have retained a large marri (redgum) in the top corner of the block which features on our label. This tree stands as a testimony to our commitment to striking a balance between caring for our environment, and caring for and managing our vineyard.