Little Buteo

Little Buteo 2022

Rigion: Weinviertel, Austria

Grape: Grüner Veltliner

Color: White

I fell in love at first sight with the label of this bird(buzzard), which also lives in Akita!

A green-yellow colour with aromas of green apple and yuzu.
Usualil Gruner has a strong fruity flavor but this is not too fruity and on the dry side.
The citrus fruit has just the right amount of acidity, so it doesn't overpower the food and is perfect as an accompaniment to a meal.
It's also nice that it's soothing with an alcohol content of 11.5%.

This buzzard (a type of hawk) that preys on small animals that only grow in soil where lush crops grow, and is a symbol of our approach to nature.
"Buzzards fly over my fields. To me they are sentinels protecting the fields, symbols of freedom, strength and wildness," says Michael.

After pressing the grapes, the wine is fermented and aged 50% in stainless steel tanks and 50% in old barrels.
Unfiltered and unfined.

[Producer information]

Austria's northernmost region, the vast Weinviertel, stretches from the Danube in the south to the Czech border in the north, and from the Mannhartsberg in the west to the Slovak border in the east. The Weinviertel is not just a producer of Grüner Veltliner; there is also a wide variety of other grape varieties available. However, Grüner Veltliner remains undisputedly the leader in Weinviertel wine consumption.
The approximately 6,700 hectares cultivated there not only account for half of the total area of ​​Grüner Veltliner in Austria, but also for almost half of the world's production.

The village of Hohenruppersdorf, where Michael Gindl's winery is located, is located 30km north of Vienna, surrounded by gently sloping hills and forests at an altitude of 240m above sea level. Winemaking has been a livelihood in the village since ancient times, as evidenced by the mention of the village's oldest vineyard, "SOL," in a 14th-century document. The village's 220 hectares of vineyards make it the largest wine-producing region in the southern Weinviertel.

The soil is mainly composed of loam and loess, and the climate is continental with warm summers and cold winters, with temperatures sometimes dropping to minus 25 degrees Celsius.
"When I was a child, it always snowed in the winter. But now it doesn't snow, just a little rain..." says Michael, and the effects of climate change are being felt here as well. In fact, temperatures don't drop as much in the winter now, posing a new challenge for wine producers. He says it's now so warm that it would be better to compare it with Burgenland than with other Weinviertel regions.
Like other Austrian winemakers, the Gindl family has not only been involved in winemaking, but also in growing grain, raising livestock, and forestry. This tradition has been passed down unbroken since 1807. Michael, born in 1983, was influenced by the early death of his grandfather and was already in charge of winemaking while still in high school. He never traveled abroad for agricultural or winemaking training, instead focusing solely on himself and his own winemaking. He graduated from agricultural school in 2002, and naturally, he had already made the decision to take over the entire family farm, which he did in 2005.
He will never forget the decisive and shocking experience he had the previous Christmas, 2004, that led him to where he is today.
"At Christmas, I tasted a 2003 vintage Welschriesling that I had made. I couldn't believe it and was shocked... It hadn't even been a year, but it had already passed its peak and was oxidized. However, the 1979 and 1983 vintage wines that I drank with my grandfather were in 2L bottles and very simple styles, but they were still fresh and enjoyable. I wondered why my wines were so different, and why my grandfather's wines were more lively, and I went back in memory.
The answer I arrived at was very simple. My grandfather made wine in a simpler way. He didn't interfere with the wine. He was more patient and gave the wine more time. This experience was the start of everything for me, and it was like a dawn.

After this experience, Michael immediately began to take longer to press, ferment, and age the wine, letting it rest on the lees and quickly abandoning filtering. At the same time, he began to reassess the way he looked at the vineyards.
First, we will rent out all of our grain fields and create a system that allows us to focus more on farming. We will try and implement biodynamic farming methods and improve the fields as stoically and as strongly as possible.
For example, in this region, the average person would plant about 3,000 grape vines per hectare, but he plants 7,000, and in the best plots, 9,000. This is not for the sake of harvest volume, but is based on the belief that healthy competition between the vines will make the grapes stronger in the long run.
Since implementing biodynamic farming methods, the fields have become filled with insects, wild birds, and wildflowers. In recent years, the farm has also increased the number of livestock, including cows, horses, and sheep, to bring more biodiversity to the fields. As a result, the fields are full of energy and much more resistant to diseases and pests.
In 2010 he reclaimed all the grain he had rented out and now owns 25 hectares of land, mostly cattle and horse feeding areas and grain fields, of which 10 hectares are vineyards.

The wine making process now involves slowly pressing the grapes over time, without adding any yeast, using only natural yeast and achieving stable fermentation without temperature control.
"I try to intervene as little as possible in the natural fermentation process. Nothing, actually!" he says. He ages his wines in barrels with the lees for a long period of time, and adds only small amounts of antioxidants before bottling. In the future, he plans to use fewer stainless steel tanks for his white wines and more acacia and oak barrels from his own forests.

Michael has mostly worked alone in the fields with his horses.
"During the harvest, buzzards fly over my fields. To me, they are sentinels, guarding the fields, and a symbol of freedom, strength and wildness. That's why they're on the label of Grüner Veltliner."
Just as the residents of Hohenruppersdorf have loved freedom for generations, Michael himself has loved freedom and has worked on winemaking in his own style and at his own pace. He has become who he is today by facing himself, enjoying himself and growing. Michael's winemaking journey, which began in his teens, is still in the middle, but perhaps he sees himself reflected in the buzzard, as he continues to think and act freely and practice biodynamic farming with a variety of ideas.
Demeter certified in 2016.