We have now had a good 9 years of work and energy gone into the vineyard’s and the rest of the property here at Nikau Farm. We have planted 3 orchard blocks, brought in sheep, runner ducks, cattle, pigs and chickens. As well as planted hundreds of native and exotic plants. All to say, we are now starting to see the fruits of our labour.
This progress is no more evident than in the vineyards. Converting both vineyards from spur pruning to cane pruning was a mammoth job in itself. Then beginning the practice of compost tea brewing and application, hand weeding and the selection and further enhancement of under vine and mid row species for more biodiversity.
But, the biggest thing has been understanding. Getting to know the site and the fruit it produces, it’s intricacies, it’s character, it’s nuances. All things that are only revealed (or noticed) after season upon, season in the vines and in the cellar.
It’s been (and still is) a steep learning curve but the wines are now becoming very reflective of the work that’s gone in and of the understanding that has been gained.
The soils here are mostly a layered bed of sedimentary materials including compressed sandstone, silica, siltstone and mud-clast conglomerate formed over 65 million years ago. Effectively ancient sea beds which seem to give the wines a complex minerality and structure.
2024 was a very good growing season and we picked exceptionally healthy fruit at a baumé of 11.5 and a TA (titratable acid) of 11.9 in the cool of the early morning on the 27th of February.
The fruit was hand sorted and hand destemmed and then cold soaked for 48 hours so as to start fermentation very slowly. It spent 10 days in that state where it began ferment and received one light pump-over per day. It was then pressed to a small stainless steel tank to finish ferment as juice. This is where it sat undisturbed for the next 9 months until bottling. It was bottled by hand and received an s02 addition of 10ppm at this time to protect from oxygen exposure.
This years wine is slightly darker than the 2023 but still very light in terms of Pinot. It’s very well structured and has all of the usual brambly Nikau Pinot Noir complexity. It has such a freshness about it this year too that I absolutely love and perhaps a more lively expressive feel to it than last years version.
Another pure expression of site and season from the Nikau home block.
About Nikau Farms
Dane Johns has carved a formidable reputation making some of Australia's best natural wines. His hugely popular Momento Mori wines have a cult following and it's not hard to see why. The Nikau Farms wines are from Dane and Hannah's Gippsland vineyards.
They operate with the ideology of creating wines that first and foremost respect the living and are wines that they like to drink and share. They farm two sites one on the steep hills of Strezelecki Ranges in Gippsland and another beneath the Black Snake Ranges in the Tonimbuk valley.
Farmed strictly with organic principles and a appreciation of the living and dynamic environment around them. Nikau Farm wines are all very small batch with no use of new oak or mechanical pumps used on the wines, no fining or filtering and no additions apart from occasionally a tiny amount of S02 when required.
Snapshot
Region: Gippsland, VIC
Country: Australia
Alcohol: 11%
Vintage: 2024
Size: 750ml
Closure: Wax sealed cork
Varietal: Pinot Noir
