German wine 2005 – rain forces picking

Middle Mosel growers largely started picking this past weekend or today.

Rheingau and Rheinessen reports show they started in earnest last week.

It was raining off and on the first two weeks of August when I was there,
but as you'll recall from my earlier report, at that point grapes were in rude good health, about two weeks in advance of normal, and it seemed likely acids would remain high.  It also seemed unlikely anything could seriously compromise the health of the fruit.  Unfortunately, that appears to have been a...