DOCTORS FLAT

THE WINEMAKER
The story of Doctors Flat Vineyard begins in the late 1980s, in France and California, where Steve Davies first encountered great practitioners of old world winemaking, and the best of new world innovators. Determined to make quality wine, he returned to New Zealand for postgraduate study, and after a brief detour into Sauvignon Blanc production moved back to the Napa Valley, California.

Having served an apprenticeship making great Bordeaux reds at Newton the first clear steps toward New Zealand was the move, in 1996, to Saintsbury and making Pinot Noir. By 1999 Steve had settled in Central Otago, making Pinot for Akarua and on the hunt for his own land. He was looking for something in particular—a site that would offer all the conditions he had come to believe were essential for great Pinot. It was a long and thorough search, and in 2002 he found it, an elevated site on deep glacial gravels in Bannockburn. Doctors Flat Vineyard was a reality

THE VINEYARD
Doctors Flat Vineyard is an organically farmed 3-hectare vineyard in Bannockburn, Central Otago.

The soil is deep gold-bearing gravels deposited by receding glaciers about 480,000 years ago. The area was intensively mined for gold throughout the 1800s, the claim here was held by the Deep Lead & Doctors Flat Mining Co. However, the gold and gravel of the vineyard block were left largely undisturbed.

To the benefit of Pinot Noir: at around 8 metres deep the gravels offer a large volume of soil for roots to explore and abundant minerals resources. The meagre water holding capacity and energy needed to draw sustenance from such depth checks vigour and produces balanced vines. At about 100m above Lake Dunstan it is cooler than most Bannockburn vineyards, with an increased risk of poor crop levels, but in return the fruit gains in flavour, identity and balance.

The three hectares of Pinot Noir were planted in 2002: five blocks combining two rootstocks and three Dijon clones (114, 115 and 777) on VSP trellis. The clones, selections from Burgundy, have adapted perfectly and are more at home than the original Central Otago selections.