Lucie Morton looks at home in a vineyard, striding among the vines, pruning shears in hand. She stops to inspect the lush leaves and developing clusters, pruning a bit as she goes, then fanning the pruned leaves out to inspect their health.
We’re walking through the rows of vines at Early Mountain Vineyards, where Lucie serves as a consultant. Early Mountain is a quintessential Lucie Morton vineyard, with carefully tended vines and mindfully managed soil, combining to yield the best grapes possible with the least amount of negative impact on the biodynamics of the land upon which they are grown.
Lucie is a well-known and respected viticulturist and one of the world’s few ampelographers—a grape botanist who identifies grape varieties by their leaves. It’s a career that started in the 1970s on her parents’ farm on the Potomac River in King George, Virginia, and eventually grew to cover vineyards all over the world. In recent years, she has taken on a consultation role at an increasing number of vineyards in Virginia and the Mid-Atlantic. She is passionate about the potential of Virginia wine.
“I believe we absolutely have the climate and soils to make wonderful wines,” she says. “The choices we make—in how we grow the grapes, which rootstocks, which clones, understanding things like if the [soil’s] potassium is high, how did it get that way—that’s what I’m about.”
Joining us on our trek through the Early Mountain vines is Jonathan Hollerith, vineyard manager and part of the winemaking team. He and Lucie work closely to oversee the vineyard’s vines, and together are pioneering new, lower-chemical-impact approaches to winegrowing in Virginia, where the climate can make funguses and pests a true menace to grapes. It starts with the soil—analyzing its makeup and seeking to bolster its health as much as possible—and continues with meticulous management of the vines and clusters. While these approaches to winegrowing are not new per se, combining them here in Virginia represents an evolution for the state’s winemaking. Lucie gives Early Mountain a lot of credit in its interest in furthering the science and approach to Virginia winegrowing.
“Early Mountain’s letting us do it,” she explains of the methods she and Jonathan and the Early Mountain team are employing across the rolling fields of grapevines. Indeed, Early Mountain seeks to support and further the Virginia wine industry as a whole. One can see this in the tasting room, where staff feature not only the vineyard’s wines, but many others from across the commonwealth.
“I want things to be authentic,” Lucie says. “I want them to be sustainable in the sense that the people are treated well—which they are at Early Mountain—and that the land is treated well, and that the grapes make wine that is awesome.”
This vision of winegrowing is one Jonathan, himself the son of a winegrower, shares with Lucie. “The biggest prize is when all is said and done and you’ve retired and you’ve actually done something that’s changed viticulture for the better,” he says. “You have healthy vines, healthy grapes. You’re still making great wine. And you’re doing it in an honest way.”
Jonathan says he feels very fortunate for the opportunity to work with Lucie. “She’s got knowledge that goes back to the beginning of the Virginia wine industry,” he says. “She’s seen the crashes and she’s seen the successes.”
In fact, Lucie worked with Jonathan’s father for many years and has known Jonathan since he was a toddler. Thinking of working with him now, side by side, and a wide grin spreads across Lucie’s face.
“You hang around long enough, you get the next generation,” she says, with a laugh.
Learn more about Lucie Morton’s life and career in a story sponsored by Early Mountain Vineyards in Our Local Commons—Volume II.
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