Given that Silver Oak has a 100 acre vineyard bordering the eastern side of our property, and, our neighbor to the west sells his fruit to Caymus, it wasn't a big stretch to think that we were in a prime area to grow Cabernet. Mary Maher, vineyard manager for Harlan and the Reserve, and Peter Franus, of Franus wines, gave me the guidance and encouragement necessary to develop our vineyard.

Our property sits on a bench above the valley floor at the bottom of Soda Canyon Rd. in the Atlas Peak Appellation.  The vineyard site was once an ancient riverbed. It is slightly sloping to a center drainage that runs from east to west. In 2001, Mary Maher and I dug test pits to validate our suspicion that this would be a great vineyard site.  We discovered a mixture of soil and cobbles, which range in size from thumb to cantaloupe.  The cobbles keep the soil from being too fertile and additionally provide excellent drainage. Our test pits confirmed that we had great soil for growing Cabernet.

Next, Mary and I decided to plant on a 4' x 5' grid. This extremely tight spacing provides excellent density, but is not so tight as to rule out the ability to farm with a narrow wheel tractor.  Now we had to decide exactly what to plant. We brought Peter Franus into the process at this point to help decide on the clones of Cabernet.  It was our great fortune that Dan Barron, the winemaker for Silver Oak, offered to let us taste through the various clones on their adjacent ranch.  Our favorites from that tasting are what we ended up planting: Cabernet Sauvignon clones 337, 04 and 06, Cabernet Franc clone 04 and Merlot clone 314.

In 2003, as I neared the end of the planting and my young four acre vineyard was finally becoming established, I had to decide on someone to provide the day to day farming.  Much as I enjoyed the labor and the feeling of closeness with nature, I recognized that I would not be able to continue to farm the vineyard myself. Mary Maher suggested I talk with Pete Richmond who had recently started Silverado Farming.  He turned out to be an easy choice to tend to the day to day farming of our vines. We share the same philosophy of growing quality over quantity, paying attention to detail and respecting the soil by farming sustainably.  Together with Peter Franus, Pete and I developed a program of managing the vineyard to produce fruit with good flavors and concentration at a moderate brix level.

Every day that my dog and I walk the vineyard I take great pleasure from having grown these vines myself.  It is very satisfying to see my dream come to fruition and to enjoy the small production, top quality Cabernet Sauvignon created from our vineyard.