Australian Pinot – in a tight space

When I visited the new Spedding vineyard on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula last month, only the sight and scent of the gum trees fringing the property and the accent of viticulturist Tim Brown gave any indication that we were in Australia.

Every other aspect of this two-hectare (five-acres) plot of Pinot Noir looked to me as though it would be more at home in Burgundy – from the high density of the planting (vines just 75 cm/30 inches apart in 1.1-metre-wide/3.6-feet-wide rows, a little over 12,000 per hectare) to the cultivated soil under the vines, from the...