Home Block at Greenock
HOME BLOCK VINEYARD
SHIRAZ – 13 ACRES
With stunning views sweeping across historic Greenock township, this vineyard is renowned for delivering fruit which produces elegant wines with silky tannins.
LOCATION
Home Block is located below the original Greenock homestead of August Kalleske, which was first purchased by his father Eduard in 1855. The vineyard altitude is 292 to 300 metres above sea level. From the porch of the old homestead, one can enjoy stunning views over the vineyard into the Greenock township.
SOIL
Brown sandy loam is consistently found across this vineyard and is the deepest loam soil of our three Greenock Shiraz vineyards. Below this lies a deep layer of very tight heavy red clay, which then flows into layers of limestone. There is very good root growth conditions in the top soil but the roots have to work very hard through the compacted heavy red clay below.
VINEYARD
Like the East Block, this is also planted with east-west row orientation and 493 vines per acre. There is a mixture of clones – Kalleske old vine, clone 2 and 1654. We find that the Kalleske old vine clone produces grapes that deliver medium bodied wines, more red fruits, herbs and spice. The 1654 clone is one of the more dominant Shiraz clones planted today. This clone can produce full bodied, immensely concentrated wines with a confit of black fruits, liquorice and chocolate flavours but with this vineyard the wine displays more elegance and restraint. The same “spur” pruning method is applied to all three clones in this vineyard. A catch wire is used to allow a good balance of light, shade and airflow. The Home Block was planted in 1995 by Ian and Nathan Kalleske.
CHARACTERISTICS
The most elegant of our Greenock vineyards, producing medium-bodied wines with silky textures and supple tannins. About 90 per cent of the fruit from this vineyard is used solely for Jack’s Shiraz. The wines produced from this vineyard have vibrant aromatics of plum, cherry, currents, raspberry, perfume and eucalyptus. Herbs and spices are also present and, in some vintages, earth, gamey and savoury characters.
