Bordeaux needs rain, say the winegrowers. The region has indeed experienced records for drought, heat and sunshine since the beginning of 2011.<\/p>\n
Since January, Bordeaux has received much less precipitation than usual: 27 mm instead of 92 mm on average in January, 62 mm instead of 82 mm on average in February, less than half of the usual average of 70 mm in March and only 11.2 mm of rain instead of the average 82 mm in April.<\/p>\n
We had never seen that before, explains Jean-Claude Berrouet who works for Maison Moueix and many Pomerol wines such as Petrus, Ch\u00e2teau Trotanoy or Ch\u00e2teau La Fleur Petrus, among others.<\/p>\n
Berrouet explained to Decanter.com that sunshine and temperatures had been much higher than usual: 279 hours of sunshine in April, compared to 117 hours on average for the same month, for example.<\/p>\n
According to Eric Boissenot, consultant for some of the largest M\u00e9doc estates, the trend continued in May. <\/p>\n
According to him, even if the flowering was very homogeneous and the vines are in good health, the dry weather \u201ccould become problematic if it continued in summer because the vines would then be in a state of water stress. \u00bb<\/p>\n
For the time being, we are expecting an early 2011 harvest since the development of the vines is \u201ctwo good weeks in advance\u201d, added Boissenot.<\/p>\n