I employ environmental farming methods that avoids the use of chemical fertilizers and minimises the amount of spraying by disease monitoring and avoidance of broad-spectrum chemicals. Maintaining a living soil is also very important. This involves avoiding herbicides, returning prunings and cover crops to the soil and ploughing only at certain times of the year.

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Biodiversity is evident in our vineyards with significant hedgerows and wild fruit trees. The rows between the vines grow a variety of wild flowers and cover-crops which aids rain-penetration, microbial life and soil-porosity.

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Our soils are poor and stony, which restricts weed growth but is liable to erosion. Therefore I only plough once or twice a year to keep the topsoil alive. I mow the grasses and weeds between the rows and these, along with the prunings, are dug back into the soil to act as long-term fertilizer, aided by animal manure when required.

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In winter, we perform balanced pruning to match the capacity of each vine to its potential. In summer we trim the shoots by hand, to maintain the balance. This keeps the leaf canopy open and less likely to harbour fungal diseases while providing enough leaves for optimal ripening.

 

The Roussillon has a great climate for viticulture as most of the rain falls in the winter and in summer there is always the Tramontane wind to dry out the vines after a downpour. Therefore the need for fungicide spraying is much lower than in other regions. I use modern, highly directional spraying equipment and only spray when there is no wind. I also rotate my products to avoid building up resistance.