Michele Satta
The peculiarity of the DOC Bolgheri, established in 1984, is that it comprises an area of land facing the Tyrrhenian Sea, towards the west and surrounded by hills on the remaining cardinal points, as well as a theatre watches the stage.
It is of significant importance the presence of the sea for three reasons. The first is that it reflects the sunlight, thus allowing for a quantity and quality of light that allows a full and complete functioning of the photosynthetic apparatus of the plant, bringing the grape to very complex phenolic ripening. The second very important aspect in that the sea acts as a thermal flywheel: in definition, the summers are not too hot during the day and yet, cool at night. In this way the plant is not stressed, but rather is induced to a more fluid functioning of the secondary metabolism. Finally, there are winds blowing toward the coast. The wind is important because it makes the air less saturated with water. Moisture is one of the major causes of the development of fungal diseases and largely reflects the light of the sun, reducing the radiation on the plants. The winds that blow from the sea are directed by Monte Capanne (1,019 meters high) located on the island of Elba. The surrounding hills protect the vineyards from the wind and violent alongside sporadic showers especially in the summer. Therefore August rains that could cause insidious rot little before the harvest, are less of a threat.
Their vineyards cover a total area of about 23 hectares, including their own land as well as leased property. They are among the southernmost vineyards, in the area that the zoning made by Professor Attilio Scienza called "Accattapane". They are located in the centre of the commune of Castagneto Carducci and thus the restricted production area of Bolgheri DOC wines. In this area there are also the vineyards of Micheletti, Enrico Santini, Guado al Tasso and a little more southern the vineyards of Argentiera.
The soils are of medium consistency, with a slight tendency towards the sandy grain size. Beyond the quantitative description of the size and fertility of the soil, it is good to say that this area is close to the hills of Castagneto Carducci and to the Donoratico Tower. This proximity allows for important water reserves in the soil during the summer, because the hills collect all the spring / summer rains, allowing them to empty on to the Bolgheri plain.
The land not too far from the hills benefiting from these reserves and never goes in water stress even in years when there is not a drop of rain from May to September.
Therefore the soils are very fertile and bring plants to full vegetative expression that often must be controlled by agronomic techniques during the growing season.
The vineyards from which we vinify grapes were planted by Michele during 90s.
In each vineyard there are the vines that Michele felt, after years of observation, to be the most representative of Bolgheri (without excluding further experiments in the future). For whites they are Viognier, Vermentino and Sauvignon, while the reds are Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Syrah, Sangiovese and Teroldego. The presence of individual grape varieties in the different vineyards, allows us to have numerous expressions of varieties, so that we can understand how the vineyards behave every year. The vineyards that express greater balance and complexity will provide the grapes for our most important wines. This enables us to understand what are the characteristics that make one vineyard, better than over another, allowing us over the time to have some idea of the characteristics of our vineyards.