Château Franc Capet

Appellations

The Fronsac appellation covers an area of ​​800ha. That of Canon 300 ha.

The AOC fronsac is spread over the municipalities of Fronsac, Saint-Aignan, La Rivière, Saint-Germain-de-la-Rivière, Saillans, and Galgon. The two AOC fronsac and canon-fronsac have 170 owners and collectors. The average surface area of ​​the castles is 7 hectares and production reaches 600,000 cases per year. In both appellations, there is no castle classification.

The appellations fronsac and canon-fronsac, producing only red wine, and they extend on soils with a clay-limestone tendency.
Asteria limestone predominates on the mound and the plateaus. The molons of Fronsadais marks the ribs and valleys. This type of soils is accentuated by the diversity of very rugged reliefs. The two rivers, Isle and Dordogne, protect the vineyard from spring frosts. The presence of numerous strawberry trees and holm oaks testifies to this privileged climate.

The property

Opposite the Château Franc Capet property with these 2 plots, either 0.72 ha of vines.

The oldest plot is "Capet" in AOC Fronsac.
This plot is planted with both 95% Merlot and 5% Cabernet Franc. She is the oldest. I think the oldest feet are at least 60 years old. The width of the rows is 1.2m. Just the place to pass a vineyard tractor (0.95m).

The second younger plot is "Palaka".
It produces the Canon-Fronsac. Given its bad summer, the plot was uprooted and replanted in early July 2010 (see the video in "modification"). It is 100% Merlot. The width of the rows is 1.5m.

Reasoned Culture

The culture of the Vine is reasoned. We are not organic even if we are sensitive to the subject and what is being done. For the vine we do prophylaxis, that is to say that we implement in the vine an active or passive process aimed at preventing the onset, spread or worsening of a disease. In our case it is to reduce the risk of Downy mildew and Powdery mildew. All of our work is manual: suckering, leaf stripping. We do not use weed killer. (Glyphosate controversy) and let's work the land.

Take off

The heaving consists in using an inter-vine. It is a tool here a scrubber who works between the vine stocks. A guardian detects vines or stakes. When this guardian encounters an obstacle it retracts the ploughshare. The obstacle past the coulter is replaced and removes the earth with the grass. See the video.

Put On

Putting on is the opposite step to taking off shoes. It consists in returning the earth with a plow. The earth covers the grass and suffocates it. The grass will then grow back and it will then be necessary to take off again. The tractor speed is around 3 km / h. See the video

Wood draft

After the pruning comes the wood draft.
The cut branches are taken out and placed in the center of the row and then crushed.
This crushed wood aerates and refertilizes the soil.
Some of these branches came out to make fagots.
These bundles, once dry, are used to toast the famous Bordeaux entrecote.
They provide high heat for good grilling and a specific fragrance for the branch.

After the drawing of the woods comes the flashing, a stage which restores the trellising (stake, wire, cullet ...).
Then the vine will be stalled. Each vine is attached to the bottom wire to better resist traction during decavaillonage.
Finally the vine will be folded.
Spring is here!

Harvest

For the harvest The grapes are harvested at maturity after taste and analytical analyzes. Indeed at this time in late September, early October the grapes are red, sweet & nbsp; and & nbsp; good. It seems ripe, but only a grain analysis can tell if you can harvest or not. Harvesting is manual.

For each vintage and each appellation if the quantity harvested is sufficient, we make a stainless steel cuvée and an oak barrel cuvée.
The oak barrel cuvée uses barrels. These are new for 1/4 so that the wine is not too oaky. Since 2017, I have invested in stainless steel coils. The goal is to regulate the temperature of the wine during fermentation. During fermentation, the yeasts eat the sugar, transform it into alcohol and they give off heat and carbon dioxide. It takes about 17g of sugar to make 1% alcohol volume. At 14% vol the yeasts digested 238 g of sugar per liter.
The heat from this transformation must be dissipated. If nothing is done, the tank can go up to over 30 ° C and kill the yeasts, causing fermentation to stop.
When there is no more sugar, the yeasts die. The fermentation is finished, we have wine. From this moment, the temperature of the tank drops. We must now heat the tank to 27 °, 28 ° C to make a maceration. this lasts about 15 days to 3 weeks. The alcohol dissolves the tannins in the seeds and the pulp, followed by pouring, pressing, bottling and tasting ...

Fronsac is made from 90% Merlot and 10% Cabernet Franc.

The Canon-Fronsac is 100% Merlot.