Sip back and savor the insight as Bree Davis of Crew Selections joins us to uncork the layered world of sustainable winemaking. Our conversation takes root in the rich soil of environmental stewardship, branching out to discuss how a blend of practices including organic and biodynamic are reshaping vineyards from California's resource-scarce regions to Washington state's abundant landscapes. As we sample a vibrant Santa Barbara Pinot Noir and a crisp Lobo Hills Sauv Blanc, we'll explore the interplay between a region's bounty and its commitment to sustainability, and whether a plentiful environment might lead to a certain complacency in green efforts.
Venture through vineyard rows with us as we examine how geography and climate sculpt the winemaker's craft. Listen as we traverse the foggy Santa Rita Hills, delve into the deep roots of Paso Robles’ dry farming, and toast to the innovators reviving ancient grapes in Crete. Every glass tells a story, and ours is no exception as we celebrate the ocean's kiss on a Sauvignon Blanc from the Loire Valley and contemplate the volcanic intrigue of a Santorini Assyrtiko. These wines not only tantalize the palate but also whisper the secrets of their unique terroir.
Raise your glass to the mavericks of the wine world, those who challenge convention and enliven our senses with daring new techniques. Marvel at the creativity on display, from innovative fermentation practices to the clever spin behind a 'Right Bank Blend' that breaks free from preconceptions. We celebrate how visionaries like Morgan Lee and the mastery at Sandi Wines are cultivating not just grapes, but pioneering movements in the industry, embracing the unpredictable adventure of natural and low-intervention wines. Cheers to the bold, the audacious, and the artfully crafted wines that are transforming the tapestry of wine as we know it.
Sip back and savor the insight as Bree Davis of Crew Selections joins us to uncork the layered world of sustainable winemaking. Our conversation takes root in the rich soil of environmental stewardship, branching out to discuss how a blend of practices including organic and biodynamic are reshaping vineyards from California's resource-scarce regions to Washington state's abundant landscapes. As we sample a vibrant Santa Barbara Pinot Noir and a crisp Lobo Hills Sauv Blanc, we'll explore the interplay between a region's bounty and its commitment to sustainability, and whether a plentiful environment might lead to a certain complacency in green efforts.
Venture through vineyard rows with us as we examine how geography and climate sculpt the winemaker's craft. Listen as we traverse the foggy Santa Rita Hills, delve into the deep roots of Paso Robles’ dry farming, and toast to the innovators reviving ancient grapes in Crete. Every glass tells a story, and ours is no exception as we celebrate the ocean's kiss on a Sauvignon Blanc from the Loire Valley and contemplate the volcanic intrigue of a Santorini Assyrtiko. These wines not only tantalize the palate but also whisper the secrets of their unique terroir.
Raise your glass to the mavericks of the wine world, those who challenge convention and enliven our senses with daring new techniques. Marvel at the creativity on display, from innovative fermentation practices to the clever spin behind a 'Right Bank Blend' that breaks free from preconceptions. We celebrate how visionaries like Morgan Lee and the mastery at Sandi Wines are cultivating not just grapes, but pioneering movements in the industry, embracing the unpredictable adventure of natural and low-intervention wines. Cheers to the bold, the audacious, and the artfully crafted wines that are transforming the tapestry of wine as we know it.
All right, everybody, welcome back to the Bung Pod. I'm your host, ian King, aka Wine Wonder Boy, and I got my co-host with me, jazzy. She's here. We have an awesome guest today. Today, a personal friend of mine and Jazzy's. She's doing awesome things. She's a rep for crew selections and we are fellow wine education people. We did the same program. Welcome, bree Davis. Good to be here. Thanks for coming on the show. So today we're going to be talking mostly about sustainability. It's a big topic, big topic, sustainability in wines. But first let's get to the wines that we're going to be drinking on the pot. I brought a sustainable wine. It's from Santa Barbara, from Santa Rita Hills, pinot Noir from John Sebastian of Vineyard, from Storm Wines. I'm a big fan of Storm, shout out Ernt Storm and Axel Klammeyer, friends of mine. So I have that. And then you brought, I brought.
Speaker 2:
Lobo Hills Sauv Blanc. I actually brought several wines. We decided on this one because it's a great Washington wine and sustainability is a big thing for him. He's also just a low intervention hands off wine maker and I love that. He's trying really hard. In his mind he's not competing with Washington, he's competing with Europe.
Speaker 1:
I like that. I think that's really cool. That's how you should be.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and his wines are all vegan, so for people who are concerned about that, oh nice, so it doesn't put egg whites in anything.
Speaker 1:
Right, that's for Jasmine, and then you can take yours and I have my glass here we don't have matching ones. Wow, that's fine. You fancy, yeah, I'm fancy, I'm fancy, huh. Well, you fancy, huh, yeah. Sustainability. So does that fall under the organic biodynamic tier, or is it kind of a tier before that?
Speaker 2:
It's a tier before that, but the tiers blend all over the place.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, that's what I've gathered as well.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it's one of those things that you know. It's one of those topics that you have to have, degree upon degree in each area of the world to fully understand what it is that that all entails. Yeah, and then when you add to that, because they're generic terms, it's almost like when you, if you label the food diet, what does that mean? Right, did you take something out of it? Does it mean it's actually good for you? Does it mean it's just lower calorie, is it?
Speaker 2:
You know so people get, they know that's a good word, they know it's a buzzword. Well, what is it? What it actually means depends on where the wine is being made, where the grapes are being grown, what the laws are there, what that looks like Like. Oregon has some certifications for sustainability that really require a lot of attention. Attention be paid towards salmon habitats, things like that. Well, you're not going to see that in Europe. But then the other piece is you get, you start to get them looped together and you get government agencies that start to say, well, to be called sustainable, you have to have this certification, and it costs this much money and it's this many levels.
Speaker 3:
And you have to do all these things, to do it and get approved and jump through these hoops and have these inspections.
Speaker 2:
So increasingly there are a lot of wineries, not just in the United States and Pacific Northwest but in Europe too, who are thumbing their nose at that, and they are doing things that are more sustainable in terms of growing. Their grapes are more natural and more biodynamic in the practices than the certifications call for, but they don't necessarily have the stamp.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, and so Carhartt was or I think, still is, carhartt wines in Santa Barbara. Like when I was working there, a lot of people would ask I mean, california in general, they're all really big on sustainable because they don't have certain things, like up here in Washington we have shit, tons of water. That's something that they don't have, you know, and they don't get regularly. And so, yeah, being environmentally conscious is a huge thing in California and I feel like most of the vineyards, at least in Santa Rita Hills, most of them, are sustainable, if not organic and biodynamic.
Speaker 3:
I could say that yeah.
Speaker 1:
So that's like a huge thing for them, and also the use of things like roundup in the vineyard. That, yeah, it's a shortcut, but it also, over time, kills your soil and it washes out into other things like drinking water or the ocean or lakes, you know, and it doesn't matter if it sits in the soil. So it doesn't matter how long it hasn't been raining, for Once it rains it's going to wash out anyways because it solidifies and then it'll go back into that water form, just like any like proxy or sulfur, like SO2, it gets into a solid form, but once you put water on it it goes back into liquid. So yeah, it's a very interesting topic and I know I took the viticulture certification at WSU and sustainability was not a topic.
Speaker 3:
It wasn't Even when I took it a couple of years ago it was not even close.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, and when I moved up here to Washington after working in the California wine industry for so long, I was kind of I was actually very surprised how little wineries I've found actually care about sustainability. I wonder if that has to do with the idea, like in your mind, like, oh, we don't have certain resources, therefore we have to take care of what we do have, like California or water, but then once you live in an area of abundance of resources, they don't take care of it as much or they're not focused on taking care of it as much. Do you think that is?
Speaker 3:
part of it. Oh, I definitely, especially with the water. Like here we have the lake and that's glacier fed every single year. So for us, we see it rise come July 4th, it's full and we know we have water, and then that goes into the river and the Columbia you know that's a huge ABA right there and goes all the way down and I think, because we see it, it doesn't matter, especially for water.
Speaker 1:
Okay.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I think that when it comes to sustainability, it's such a broad term that I think it probably matters to people more in all of the other decisions they're making than to just say we're sustainable. At this point it's almost a marketing term, more so than an operational term, especially because if you're looking at terms like organic and biodynamic, those can be both applied to the viticulture process but also the winemaking process. Sustainability is almost entirely just applying to how the grapes are grown and farmed.
Speaker 3:
The farming side of things. Even though in the sustainable like to get approved for it. They talk about how you're treating your employees, how like. I mean it's so broad that it's not just are we putting roundup in our vineyard, it's okay. Are you doing this, this and this for your employees? Are you giving them the resources and all this stuff and even down to like, are you giving them healthcare? So I mean, it is a very very broad topic.
Speaker 2:
Well, and if you talk about, if you apply it to something like wine, the way that grapes grow best, it varies grape to grape, but is in a situation where they're being starved a little bit. If they have too much in terms of nutrients and water and natural resources and things, they're not going to be as flavorful, and so you have to be growing them in a place where there's some want there, and so to be able to keep growing them, you have to do basic sustainability practices to a certain degree, and I don't know anything about the actual science of farming the grapes past what it takes to just I understand the basics of it, but there are truly experts in every area of that, and when I've spoken with those people, I've heard time and time again that there are things that are on the approved list for organic that are every bit as horrifying as roundup.
Speaker 2:
Oh yeah, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. When you have a thousand decisions to make about how to grow the best fruit for the best wine for the best marketing for the best whatever, sustainability is more of a it's equal parts way of life and marketing gimmick. But in my job we also represent this one cidery out on the Olympic Peninsula, and the Olympic Peninsula is such a place of abundant natural resources but very low population.
Speaker 1:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
So to be able to run a business out there and support economically is incredibly challenging, and this particular farm uses practices of sustainability and biodynamic farming and organic farming partly because they really believe in it, but also partly as an economic tool to support their community. So I think when decisions like these are made, if someone is advertising things as sustainable, it's more a little bit about the belief system that they're applying their overall approach to, versus if you get into organic and biodynamic, you're telling somebody a little bit more about what's in the bottle and less about the actual wine itself.
Speaker 1:
All right, guys, let's take a break for a minute because if you enjoy this podcast, I have some amazing news for you. Do you want more content from us? Extra episodes per week, video podcast discounts every time we drop some dope ass merch. Do you want your opinions, hot takes and topics to be covered on the podcast and be a producer on the show? That's right, we want your opinions, we want your personal hot takes. Join the Bung Pod Jabroni Gang and get your voice heard on the show. Just head to patreoncom slash official Bung Pod and talk to us. Link is in the description. Now let's get back to the show.
Speaker 2:
Because that's going to be more winemaking practices.
Speaker 1:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
And it's going to depend a lot on where it's grown Places like Bordeaux, or we don't have a lot of vineyards out in Western Washington, but places and there are a few places in California too where things are damper. Oh yeah, you're not going to be getting the ocean.
Speaker 3:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
There are places you're going to have to spray to keep the mildew down. You're just going to have to, yeah, otherwise you're going to have no, you know one of the wines. It's like Santa Barbara.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, yeah, where this comes from Santa Rita Hills super foggy. It's a weird microclimate within Santa Barbara and California in general because it's so much further south than like Sonoma and Napa but there's so much marine layer fog that comes in from the ocean that sits in the vines and so it protects the vines, you know, from sun. And some people dry farm there as well. I know in Pasarobos, talbus Creek. They dry farm everything over there and that place doesn't get much rain but their vines have most of their vines, have been there for a long time and so the roots have an anchor. It's already found a water source, you know most of them have, and so and their wine is absolutely phenomenal, like their, the concentration, the fruit. They make light styled wines so it's lighter in body, but there's so much flavor and complexity involved and that's kind of my shit, yeah that's your thing.
Speaker 2:
Well, and they? You know, there's a. There's a vineyard on Crete called Lyra Rackus that set out to bring back a couple of grapes native to Crete specifically, but Greece in general that had essentially gone extinct because Greece tried to do what everybody was doing and plant popular grape varieties. Oh yeah, yeah, that it's not Bordeaux, they're not going to grow.
Speaker 1:
It's like you can't grow.
Speaker 3:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
Those grapes very well in Crete and so they're bringing back some of those classic to Greece varietals and they're doing it organically and they're doing it biodynamically and they're they're they're following all of those rules and practices and it's one of those old family vineyards where the land is paid for and the, the, the mechanical needs are paid for and they can. They can do that because what's happening is there are years that they get a third the yield that they would have gotten if they would have applied chemicals and other things. But that family, it's super important to them. That and some of the other farmers that they work with, it's super important to them to do this, so to speak, the old way, but it's a huge financial hit. Yeah.
Speaker 1:
Oh it's crazy, Dude grease is such a gnarly spot. Yeah, for a wine it's so nuts because, like like Santorini for a Cerdico, like the way they grow their vines because there's so much wind that comes there, it grows in baskets on the ground, so it's fucking insane.
Speaker 3:
They don't look like grapes.
Speaker 1:
They don't look like a grapevine, it just looks like a wicker basket, almost with like grapes in the middle.
Speaker 3:
So I may or may not be going there next year. Oh wow.
Speaker 1:
Take a tour of some vineyards.
Speaker 3:
Duh, it's wild Right that bitch off I mean mostly when you go to.
Speaker 1:
Santorini, they don't think about going to the vineyards.
Speaker 3:
No, I'm definitely. We're going on a cruise and I'm like I know what I'm doing.
Speaker 1:
You know, next to the ocean, which is beautiful, yeah, but like, go to the vineyards, dude.
Speaker 3:
I'm so excited I was even thinking about flying in early and going and just taste.
Speaker 2:
It's really cool. I used to be. I had a poo, poo grapevine, but it's not. I didn't have any exposure to it. Yeah, and I mean, you guys know how much. Whether you want it to or not, your palate changes tremendously when you're exposed to a lot of wine.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and the more Greek wine that I have that's very well done the more I like it, but it is very different. Yeah, it is not the same as anything people have had. If they're used to drinking classic Western Europe and New World wines, it's just not like that at all.
Speaker 1:
I mean, a Cerdico is so easy to like, if you like white wines Everybody would like that. Like because it's so light in body, it's so acid driven, there's no weird phenolic flavors in it. Like it's a beautiful, beautiful wine for like the summertime or who you know.
Speaker 2:
I've given that to friends who've asked for a Pinot Grigio and they thought I gave them a Pinot Grigio.
Speaker 1:
Yeah yeah, it would be hard to tell Pinot, grigio, gruner of Outliner, cerdico and El Vrino. Those four would be so difficult and a blind tasting to actually nail down, depending on where they're from.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I mean, if you go classic, if you go classic, it's hard.
Speaker 1:
Unless you can like for El Vrino. If you can detect that hint of sea spray that comes and re-espicious, then you could probably get that and it's re-espicious, yeah, but if it's Santa Rita Hills, yeah, then it's going to be fucking hard.
Speaker 2:
It's yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:
If it's Santa Rita Hills it's going to taste salty and like, yeah, very salty because of that fog ocean layer. So this Pinot Noir has like all of top and odd kind of salty flavors into it. But before we get into that, I do want to talk about the logo hills, Savio Blancrope.
Speaker 2:
I want to tell you about this wine.
Speaker 1:
All right, and here's why?
Speaker 2:
Because, much like you and I, but probably on an even greater degree, Tony Dollar and he would not be upset to hear me say this is a huge wine nerd. Yeah, and he is. That's cool. I'm perfectly happy to try crazy things and see if they work. I love that.
Speaker 1:
I would love to have him as a guest in the pod.
Speaker 2:
Well, he is going to be coming through here at some point.
Speaker 1:
So I'll see yeah.
Speaker 2:
We're setting it up, so we'll see oh sorry, he's supposed to go like this, yeah. I told you, so I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
Speaker 3:
He's going to be super obnoxious. He's going to be like I'm empty.
Speaker 2:
Thank you, sir. So this delightful wine right here, which is one of my favorite soft blunks domestic soft blunks is they're clean. He washes them, but he puts rocks from the vineyard where they're grown in the bottom of the fermenting tanks.
Speaker 3:
Oh really, that's so cool. Wait, that's actually fine. I'm glad that he does. That's what wine makers should do is stop doing the same thing over and over again, but even just take a small portion of your, just experiment. If you don't try it, nobody else is going to try it. That's how we got to where we are today, is people took chances?
Speaker 2:
Right and he's thinking about. When he's thinking about a soft blunk, he's not thinking about a New Zealand soft blunk, he's thinking about a northern French soft blunk and a saunceur or a pouifoumé or something like that. And he's like what is that going to be like? Where are those flavors coming from? What am I looking for there? And when he thinks of those notes, he's like well, it's going to have that minerality. Well, how am I going to get that minerality out of this?
Speaker 3:
Well, let's put some minerals right in it.
Speaker 2:
And it's Shannon Bonk. Similarly, he does a thing with oyster shells oh fuck.
Speaker 3:
Really.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it's really good. Oh my god, I dug around to see if I had a Shannon, but I had a customer. Yeah, I really want to have this guy on.
Speaker 1:
I want to talk to this guy.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, that would be so interesting you do want to talk to this guy.
Speaker 2:
And then, in a stroke of marketing genius so say it everyone who's ever tried to sell Merlot to anyone in recent years his Merlot-based red blend is called right bank blend.
Speaker 1:
Beautiful.
Speaker 2:
He did not put the word Merlot on the front of the bottle. Good idea.
Speaker 1:
He didn't put it anywhere. That's so funny, jesus Smart, very smart, wicked smile, wicked smile, wicked smile.
Speaker 2:
And I won't steal his thunder in case he's on the pod to tell the story of where the Lobo Hills name and logo and everything came from, because it is a great story.
Speaker 1:
But yeah, I'd love to hear that when I've heard people ask him.
Speaker 2:
He always starts it by talking about how most wineries, classically, in his desire to model himself after Europe, would be named after the family that owns it. But his name is Tony Dollar. So he asks everyone would you buy dollar wines? That's a fair point. So he had to come up with a different name. But yes, he's phenomenal.
Speaker 2:
Delicious too. It's fantastic. He's the second label where a lot of times when a winery has a second label it's like a I hate to say the word lesser, because that's not a less complex tier. They put a little bit less into it, into making it. His is the other. He decided his second label was going to be the more exclusive, more elevated.
Speaker 3:
A little bit more elevated.
Speaker 2:
I think that's smart and that line is called Anthony Sellers. Oh cool.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, it's fantastic. That's what Seth Kitski did, did he, yeah, with Devil as a Liar? So Devil as a Liar is Grenache, okay, and it's his high end Garnache, and so you can only buy it in three packs. I think there might be a six pack, but it's like he bought these certain barrels for it. They have like a tap on it.
Speaker 3:
Oh you're kidding.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, at least that's what it looks like from the pictures I've seen.
Speaker 1:
It's like wooden tap almost, and he gets it from a weather eye weather eye vineyards and it's not always 100% Garnache. Sometimes he puts some Sera in there. I think there's a small percentage of Sera, maybe like 10%, up to 10%, something like that, but it is a phenomenal Garnache. I had it with my friend Charlie Liebecker from Cardis and he brought that out and tasted it. It's expensive, like it's high end, and every detail, like the bottle silhouette, is really intricate and the label on it is textured right.
Speaker 3:
And like every, there's so much detail that goes into it.
Speaker 1:
And the devil is a liar. That is a fucking great name, I think I know Seth is a big fan of hip hop. He grew up on hip hop, just like me, and so when I saw a devil as a liar, I was like, oh, that's an ode to like Rick Ross. He has a song called devil is a liar, you know, and that was just a fucking phenomenal song.
Speaker 1:
So I was like, oh, this is dope, but I love it when people do the next like elevated tier of wine and put so much detail and creativity and artistry with every portion of from like where they get the grapes from, to like the label design to the bottle, silhouette, everything. It looks so cool.
Speaker 3:
See, that's why I think I like how he put rocks in his wine, because wine is just a recipe, it's an art and you know, people get comfortable doing the same thing Like, oh, that wine sold that year, I should do it again, which you can do. But at the same time, you're also a scientist. You have an art to this, like you know what you should and shouldn't do. Obviously, you're not going to put like tomatoes in it or I don't know some random thing, but play with your wine, get artsy. I mean, that's why you're in Right. Exactly, it might be scary, but then yeah.
Speaker 3:
I mean, that's where I think, morgan Lee.
Speaker 1:
Amazing. He did a skin contact. I think it's a virtual meter. No, sorry, morgan, you're listening to this, I don't remember. I think it's good, it's a meaner. He hasn't orange. Yeah, yeah, he's a skin contact virtual meter and it is dry, not sweet at all, it's lean, no phenolic bitterness.
Speaker 1:
I'm like this is the best orange wine I've ever had in my life. Usually I don't gravitate towards those because it's just like a weird. Most orange wines I've had have a weird phenolic bitterness at the end that I can't fucking stand. But I've had two that I've really liked. One was his. That was the second one I liked. The first one was a place in Paso that my friend was an assistant wine maker for and they're like an Italian, so they did oh geez, this great variety. You can help me on this.
Speaker 1:
All right, guys, let's take a break for a minute because if you enjoy this podcast, I have some amazing news for you. Do you want more content from us? We have other episodes per week, video podcasts, discounts every time we drop some dope ass merch. Do you want your opinions, hot takes and topics to be covered on the podcast and be a producer on the show? That's right, we want your opinions. We want your personal hot takes. Join the Bung Pod Gibroni gang and get your voice heard on the show. Just head to patreoncom slash official Bung Pod and talk to us. Link is in the description. Now let's get back to the show. Fallen Gina.
Speaker 2:
No, that is the one that I'm thinking of. That's the same one. Yeah, but I haven't, I've never had it.
Speaker 1:
So yeah, it was. Yeah, fallen Gina was. I mean, they made it into an orange wine and that was. That was the first orange wine I've had and I was like, oh, orange wine is fucking amazing. Yeah. So I had some other ones. I was like, fuck orange wine. After that I was like like the Fallen Gina one, that was the only one that I actually when did you have that? Where was?
Speaker 3:
it.
Speaker 1:
It was in Paso, okay, and the. It's a really small winery in Paso, in Tin City, is what it's called, but I don't remember the label name. Offhand it's something Italian, but anyway, they do a great job there.
Speaker 2:
I and you had a front row seat for this. You'll understand it. I have stopped saying I don't like this type of wine or this grape. Yeah, unless. If I do catch myself saying that sentence, I try to add the word yet because yeah, I haven't had a good representation of it yet.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, or it could be, it could be my palette, it could be the representations I've had. Yeah, it could be either of those things. But just simply for the number of times I have poured a wine for someone who insists they don't like that grape and it's because they just haven't had a good version of it yet, yeah, but I struggle with the orange wines I've had. Yeah, there is. There's a producer, a very small batch producer, out of out of I think she's out of Woodinville, essia. Yeah, yeah, I Icelandic family. Yeah, can you. Yeah, they have a, she has a. She has an orange wine that I liked more than I thought I would. It's like okay, all right, there's a granache from Stillwater Creek.
Speaker 1:
It's fucking amazing. Fuck it. I want to have her on the pod too.
Speaker 2:
And that's then. That's what I say. I love her wine, I love her wine making style, I love what she's doing. So I said, okay, well, it will, we'll get there. You know, I'll try some more, but it's there. I mean there's Baby steps. Well, I mean some of its exposure, but it's also finding it. Yeah, but then some of it is. Whenever something becomes popular, everyone does it. They don't do it. Well, and there are a lot of people out there right now who are making bad orange wine because it's a little bit trendy.
Speaker 1:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
Oh for sure, Just like pet nat pad pet nats because it's trendy.
Speaker 1:
And yeah, and then it gives a bad name to those styles of wine which I've had some really awesome pet nats Right.
Speaker 2:
And I've had some awesome orange wines. Thank you, dusty and Riley. Who are they? Who are Dusty and Riley? Oh, everyone in Washington at least should know Dusty and Riley, they are besties, right, yeah? And they are Saundra and Seydrat respectively. Oh, the Saundra, okay, and they have they did, they have a combined project that's a carbonic nebbiolo.
Speaker 1:
Oh, sounds like my shit right there.
Speaker 2:
That is yeah, that is right, I had. I saved one for you and I told you I had it, but you got to drink those quick, yeah, and we didn't get together to drink it quick, so it didn't happen. But I'll get you another one minute.
Speaker 1:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
When it comes out.
Speaker 1:
Maybe when I meet the Saundra peeps.
Speaker 3:
Yeah. That would be really fun. Yeah, they're phenomenal.
Speaker 2:
And speaking of our whole sustainability, organic thing, those guys do all the right stuff. Yeah, when it comes to that kind of thing, they are very all natural, low intervention, you can tell looking at their wines. You know, a lot of times in America especially, we think we look at a cloudy wine and we think that's a bad wine. Yeah, and it's really nice to just see people moving away from finding a lot.
Speaker 3:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
And put their hand. Fine.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, we're talking about Tony Dollar and his style A lot on it.
Speaker 2:
And it's very a lot of the reason he does a lot of the like throw rocks in the tank and stuff like that is because he's determined to not put anything into the wine that wasn't already there.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I like that which is good.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, you know, and more and more people are using natural yeasts. But some of that depends on where you live. Yeah, you're going to have to supplement. A lot of people are going to have to supplement their yeast, depending on where they're making wine. But yeah.
Speaker 1:
I know that the minimal Saundee wines in San River de Hills. They started making their own yeast out of each. So they're growing it from yeah, through the vineyards, cool. So it's really cool.
Speaker 2:
That's the most Raj thing I've ever heard of Raj Raj does yeah. I could have guessed who is doing that.
Speaker 1:
I think it's mostly Sausie Mormon now, because Raj moved to Cambria and he started his own thing called feeling farm.
Speaker 2:
He's got an entire farm situation going on.
Speaker 1:
He does and I heard a recent podcast that he was on like an update on like what he's doing and stuff he's like yeah, I'm just loving you know farming. It's been fun Like I just have it's all biodynamic and.
Speaker 2:
I heard that podcast too. I can't remember who was interviewing him. It might have been on the SOM TV podcast.
Speaker 1:
It could be the SOM TV podcast.
Speaker 2:
I think I can hear him in my head going you're doing what?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, jason.
Speaker 2:
Wines.
Speaker 1:
Jason Wines, yeah.
Speaker 2:
He was so confused. What are you doing? Is that working? Not really. I'm figuring it out. I got a bunch of goats. I want to get some more goats, yeah.
Speaker 1:
That's exactly what I'm saying in the interview. I have some dogs. I have some Pyrenees Mountain dogs out here, oh my gosh, she's so funny.
Speaker 3:
But I mean, tavis Creek is another one.
Speaker 1:
Like they're the one that does the pickpoole. They, you know they're the one.
Speaker 1:
Paso that do the dry farming. They are huge into biodynamics and they have. They have a shepherd. It was on salary just at the fucking winery and I used to be a wine club member there. I'm sad I'm not right now, but I used to go to their wine club parties because I was in Santa Barbara. I was like, yeah, it's not too far, it's like you know, a couple of hour drive, whatever, let's go. And they, they're wine club party. They're like we have a huge announcement to make. We have, we have two additions to our winery and we are so we're also very excited they brought these two Spanish massive dogs.
Speaker 1:
Yes, and so they already have like three Pyrenees Mountain dogs, but he's like we got these Spanish mastives. They're going to look over a flock they have like sheep and goats and that's going to be me.
Speaker 3:
It's so funny.
Speaker 1:
It's all my chickens and how detailed they put into every little thing at the winery is just so fucking amazing Like I really respect people that just look into the detail and every single part of it, from the growing to bottling to everything. Like it's amazing.
Speaker 2:
And it's the more I haven't been in this world long enough to not still have incredibly fluid opinions about everything, because I just I learn every experience. I take something else away from it or something works or changes a little bit and I have a deep love and appreciation for the natural low intervention side of things. But at the same time I have a lot of respect for you know better, living through science, right you?
Speaker 3:
know, and there's, there's there's a balance to be struck.
Speaker 2:
Absolutely, but one of my favorite things I've ever seen in my life. That's a natural solution this fall, but while there's still fruit on the vines, I was in one of the one of the vineyards that's owned by a Valdemar estates and it's on I think it was I love Valdemar. They're great, they're amazing, and and I'm trying to remember I'd screw up if I said where it was. I think it might have, because we went, they took us to a few and I'm trying to remember which one this was in, and I think it was seven hills, but I'm not positive when there are blocks that are owned by different vineyards, right, so it wasn't just them.
Speaker 2:
And as we're driving through to get to their block, I was looking around and I'm like, how do these guys not have netting when they haven't harvested yet? But these, the grapes are super ripe. Do they not have a bird problem here? And we're, we get stopped and we're looking around and I'm just like Um, I have a question and it might be a dumb one, sorry on the new person here Mm-hmm, why'd you guys not net your grapes? And the owner has uses his name. Hey, sue says did. Did you see the white vans on the way in. You see that white van. I said yeah.
Speaker 1:
Oh, I've heard about this. Okay, explain it.
Speaker 2:
Yeah people who own the, the, the vineyard, the blocks of vines. They combine and they pay for two Falcons.
Speaker 3:
Well, that's fucking sick.
Speaker 2:
Patrol the vines a good business to have. And so the the white van that he was talking about was a falconer who was, and I saw the guy standing out there, but I didn't, I just figured he was somebody checking on his vines or whatever. And and sure enough, there's a Belkin into the falcon business out there patrolling the vineyards and I don't know. I mean what, the way it was told to me, which to me this is incredible, but I'm sure there are people skilled enough to do it these falcons are trained to be aggressive enough with the starlings that they will leave and not want to come back, but not actually kill them or like hurt them like that. Really I don't know how you teach them to be that right level of aggressive, but that's supposed to be.
Speaker 3:
Falcons are amazing.
Speaker 2:
Amazing. Well, this, this whole entire huge, massive Vineyard is patrolled by it. That's dope, yeah, amazing, huh. Oh my god, all those plastic nettings that aren't being made 30.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:
That falcon idea is fucking awesome.
Speaker 2:
It's so cool, yeah, I mean, I don't know what, I don't know how long those plastic nets are good for.
Speaker 3:
Is this a new business plan? Just gonna start raising falcons and be like hey.
Speaker 2:
I'll bring my falcon here vineyard. Yeah, seriously, there's like you're a winery is around here.
Speaker 3:
I could just whoop up the money, literally.
Speaker 2:
I mean, how would you, how could you not? It would be extremely lucrative.
Speaker 3:
I would, I could have like ten falcons, yeah, and just send my people out.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, one month out of here anyway, she called big boy from outcast, because that's what he's on now Big boy from outcast.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I know who you're talking about.
Speaker 1:
Yeah he's a falconer now he is a.
Speaker 2:
Seriously.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, that's what he's doing with his life, andre 3000 is playing the fucking wooden flute. And Big boy is a falcon.
Speaker 3:
NUR guy.
Speaker 1:
I don't know what they're called. He's a term.
Speaker 3:
I mean, I mean enough money trainer like he trains falcons.
Speaker 2:
That's so cool yeah it's. If I made enough money to just do whatever for a living and I just I'd be like sure I want to learn how to train falcons. Let's do it.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, that's way awesome. This is a genius idea. It's sick.
Speaker 2:
All right, that's dope. I learned a lot of things that day, but that was my favorite thing, yeah, that's amazing.
Speaker 1:
Well, I think we conclude our time. We didn't get into the Peter Noir John Sebastian from Stormwinds, but that's for our patreon people and they get to experience that with us. So that's going to be awesome. So thank you guys for listening. Welcome to the Bong Pod. Thank you so much. Thank you, bree. Thank you for having us Cheers, cheers. Music.