It’s cold this morning. The vineyard looks like a battlefield. In the fog and the damp, the vines are resting.

Stéphane is there with two workers, doing winter pruning, one of the wine-maker’s long and exacting tasks. There is something magical about pruning, because it is a mixture of destruction and creation. Destruction, because everything that is no longer of use is taken away; creation, because while pruning, wine-makers can see clearly what their vine trees will look like in nine months’ time – they can imagine berries on the vines, berries dotted about here and there on branches that still only exist in their minds’ eyes.

In winter, when the sap level has fallen and the leaves have dropped off, the vine shoots from that year – the ones that bore the harvest – are cut off, but the “eyes” are left, because the shoots for the next harvest will grow out from them. Every pruning cut made with the secateurs must be done with a watchful eye. Each cut means taking a decision, and Stéphane’s long experience means he can progress very quickly. But I just don’t have the eye for it….

After pruning, the vine trees are small, as they have been severely cut back – all that remains are rather pitiful little bits of wood. It’s hard to imagine that all this will grow at an amazing rate when the hot weather returns, in five months’ time.

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