Grape lunacy 29 January 2007

A sleepless night has Chris Mullineux wondering about the effect of the moon
on his grapes in Tulbagh

Unless you were in a coma recently, you’ll hopefully have enjoyed a mystical moment or two with the awesome Comet McNaught. Last night as I gazed at this visitor to our quiet corner of the galaxy, I started thinking about the cosmos, and something that had happened a couple of weeks ago.

It was about 2am, and I suddenly found myself awake and unable to get back to sleep – one of those evenings where no flock of imaginary sheep is large enough to count your way back to dreamland. After first lying in bed frustrated, my mind wandered, and I eventually started to try to work out the reason for my insomnia.

Coffee or other stimulants were not to blame. I also didn’t think it was insomnia from any form of mental turmoil – though I did have a lot going on, I’m generally not that prone to stress, and I was lying there wondering why I couldn’t sleep, not about all sorts of other things.

Suddenly it hit me. It was full moon. Can a full moon keep you awake?

Deciding to use my time properly, I got up, made myself a cup of rooibos (caffeine-free … just in case), and googled ‘the moon’s effect on sleep’. From all corners of the globe flooded in reports and discussions on the topic. It seems that many people suffer from insomnia around the full moon, others suffer from strange dreams and nightmares, and some even sleepwalk.

Taking it further, it was interesting to discover that it’s a period of general mental instability. Prison wardens know to expect a time of discord among inmates, sometimes including cell fights and riots. Those in charge of mental institutions know to keep a closer watch on their patients, some policemen believe they need to be more alert than usual at this time (possibly because there may be a few ‘loonies’ about?), and animals are twice as likely to bite people during a full moon. There is also the fact that female menstrual cycles closely follow the lunar month.

Clearly the moon does exert some influence on us, but what is the mechanism? Being a man of science, I searched further for concrete evidence, but though a few suggestions are out there, nothing empirical came up. Though many people are sure the moon is to blame for their insomnia (and other weird behaviour), nobody is able to provide grounds for their belief that I’m 100 percent happy with.

Moon and grapes

In the meantime, as I sat listening to the birds starting to chirp, watching the moon set in the growing light of dawn, my thoughts lead me to the racking, blending and bottling we had just completed, the harvest that is almost here, and winter’s pruning that, with the severe heat that is currently on us, seems a long way away.

In our vineyards at TMV we have always scheduled pruning to occur around the phases of the moon. Not because of some romantic notion that the moon shares an esoteric link with vines, but because of the effect the moon has on liquids (and what is dissolved in them) as it orbits the earth. So, while I question whether the moon was to blame for my sleeplessness that night, I am happy to extend the reality of the moon’s influence on ocean tides to a belief of its influence on moisture in soils, and therefore sap in plants.

But why do some winemakers take the position of the moon, or any other cosmic bodies into account when working with wine?

If you research the topic, you will inevitably come to the mystical and controversial world of root, fruit, leaf, and flower days. Taking the argument that the cosmos influences nature one step further, proponents of cosmic calendars believe that as with plants, certain times are better suited to working with wine than others.

Just how this all works is as complex as the cosmos itself. But, as with my insomnia, I am open (but still in need of some solid evidence to be convinced) to the possibility that the cosmos can influence the taste of wine. There are times when I notice subtle differences in character of wines I know well, especially when still in barrel, before being sulphured and bottled. These differences revert back to a previous character the following time I taste the wine – one day it is velvety and fruity, the next day tight and mineral.

The problem is that, though it is a lovely notion, we have no way of proving the link between the cosmos and wine, so as with the moon’s effect on my sleeping patterns, there are those who will believe and those who won’t. What cannot be denied, though, is the fact that a large number of the worlds greatest, most characterful wines are made by those following cosmic cycles.

While the moon might exert some unexplained force that caused my sleeplessness, it could easily be due to something as simple as the extra light given off at full moon (and my poor quality curtains), or the distant barking of dogs kept awake by the moon. Either way, it does seem that our satellite was somehow involved.

It is the same for those great wines made by crazy growers working in tune with the cosmos. Maybe there is something to their esoteric conviction, but maybe the reason their wines are so magical is simply because their delight in nature and the cosmos makes them spend more time in their vineyards and with their wine.

Whatever the truth may be, I am just as enthralled by their wines as I have been by the comet. What’s more pleasing is that while our night skies will return back to normal, we will be able to fill the comets void with these loony winemakers cosmic wine.