One of the confounding conclusions that we’ve come to, over the last several months of this blog chronicling our exploration of local vineyards, is that these neighboring grape growers are fully, blissfully content to leave the actual winemaking to others. A lot of wineries repeat the industry saw about “great wine starts in the vineyard,” but it strikes me that the weather-dependent farming aspect of winemaking would be the riskiest part of the entire process.
And in our own miniscule way, and having now lived in Oakley for an entire cycle of the four seasons, Kathy and I discovered just how tough it is to coax a plant —any plant — to maturity around here.
When Kath and I moved into our foreclosed McMansion just before Labor Day 2009, we were really excited about getting a California garden going: raised beds, fresh herbs, citrus trees that we could actually plant in the ground, and tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes! Plus, our front and back yards were a virtual clean slate (Our house was a former model home for the development, supposedly with all the bells and whistles; a neighbor told us that the former owner, in addition to “looting” the plantation shutters and assorted fixtures from the house, also held a garage sale to sell off the landscaping). We had no desire to ever use the underground sprinkler system (some of the pop-up heads were busted, and the whole property was divided into five confusing watering zones), and we were eager to go drought tolerant. So, off to the local home-and-garden center we went for yard tools, citrus trees and, eventually, a rototiller to chew up what remained of the lawn.
Flash-forward to the end of this summer, and it became apparent that our gardening experiment was a complete disaster. The original sod had been installed with a backing of plastic mesh, which continually jammed the rototiller. Our “soil” consisted of clay that was packed so hard that there were entire spots we couldn’t even get a pointed shovel to pierce. And the intense sun and summer heat, which we thought would allow the citrus, rosemary, lavender and thyme to thrive, instead baked them so hard that our poor Meyer lemon tree looked like something after a nuclear holocaust. Hours of work and money spent, wasted.
So, with the rainy season looming, Kath decided that the time was right to call in the professionals. She did some Web research, and we had landscape designer Kelly Marshall come out for a consultation. We liked her style, she dug our style, and we decided to take the next step with her. A few days later, Kelly was out to take measurements and photos of the front and back yards, and on the afternoon of Halloween, she came to the house with her design, a scale architectural drawing of our property, with her plant choices placed and labeled. Her plant and color selections perfectly complemented our sensibilities. It was nothing short of amazing, and we decided to take the final step.
As designer, Kelly doesn’t do the physical install herself, but she recommended a landscaper with whom she’d worked in the past. I phoned Moises Garcia of M&G Landscape to come out, review Kelly’s design, and prepare a bid for the installation. By the end of the week, he came back to the house with his bid for the install of Kelly’s elements, including a new drip irrigation system, flagstone walkways, removal of every vestige of sod/weeds and existing plants, soil amendment, pea gravel and mulch placement, and in-ground planting of all of Kelly’s recommended foliage. Gotta tell ya, his bid was a fraction of what we were expecting to have to pay. We said yes.
Moises turned out to be an artist as well as technician. I was home to watch much of the weeklong transformation, and his blend of hard physical work, perfectionism and easygoing manner was astounding. Many times, I’d look out the window thinking to myself the landscaping equivalent of “Oops, he missed a spot” only to discover that it was all being taken care of. I saw him out with his tape measure, Kelly’s scale rendering in hand, making certain that Kathy’s raised beds, now being located in the back yard on new gravel, were perfectly spaced. I’m still amazed at how he was able to tap into select portions of the old irrigation pipe infrastructure to deliver water to the new drip system in areas separated by existing driveway, patio and walkways. I was grateful that he hauled away all the old vegetation, weed barrier, rocks and stumps (Moises made sure that all stumps were dug out, not just cut to ground level) and cleaned all debris off the driveway and paths at the end of each work day. He thought of everything, and didn’t cut corners as he put those thoughts into action.
On the penultimate day, the plants were delivered. Kelly came out to physically place the plants according to her schematic. The next day, Moises and his crew put ‘em into the newly amended soil; as one section was planted, drip tubing would be snaked through the landscape and covered in new mulch. Ingenious, efficient and, ultimately, gorgeous.
Kelly told us at our initial meeting that this time of year was the perfect time to do this kind of project: The young plantings avoid the scorching heat and benefit from the abundant winter rains as they overwinter.
The weather was beautiful for the five-day project; within two days, the rains came. Seems that not only were Kathy and I lucky to find Kelly Marshall and Moises Garcia, but our dealings with Mother Nature was fortuitous, too. We are now more than happy to leave the “farming” to the grape growers.
We’re pleased to raise a glass to Kelly, Moises and Ma Nature. The 2007 Cline Ancient Vines Carignane hails from CoCo County fruit. It exhibits a translucent eye of strained plum in the glass. The nose is actually the most demonstrative aspect of the wine, but needs a lot of swirling to give up its aromas of clove and other baking spices. In the mouth, it’s rather light, but with a nice streak of acidity and a short-to-medium finish rendering it a great quaff.
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