Sydney International Wine Competition

"Why are wine people moving down the biodynamic path? There's one glaringly obvious reason and that's the environmental one. I don't know about you, but I'm actually a little bit scared about what we're doing to the planet and the way we're doing it and how it's going to make the life of my children much more difficult than the life I am experiencing now."

Ladies and Gentlemen:

Before we start, I'd like to ask you all a few questions:

First, let me name some famous winemakers:

Domaine de la Romanee Conti in Burgundy; Zind Humbrecht in Alsace; Chapoutier in the Rhone Valley; Pingus in Spain

A bit closer to home: Milton Vineyard in Gisborne; Rippon Wines from Central Otago; Seresin in Marlborough; all in New Zealand

And in Australia: Carlei; Jasper Hill; Castagna; Henschke; Bass Phillip; Bindi. All fantastic names.

First question: what do they have in common? Don't answer yet. It's a question I want to come back to later.

Second question: how many people in this room have academic training in science? For example, if you are a trained winemaker, you have a science qualification..

Third question, in two parts: first part, have you ever fallen in love? You don't have to put your hand up, Madam, but I like that you did! Have you ever fallen in love?

And part B of that question is - how did you know that you were in love?

And then the last question is - why do you drink wine? Just think about that for a minute. Don't answer yet. I'm going to come back to these questions later.

Before we go on, is everybody here familiar with the concept of biodynamics? I will explain it for you in a much abbreviated form. At its heart, biodynamics is a very well defined organic system of farming. It doesn't use any synthetic, man-made chemicals. No Roundup to blitz the weeds, no systemic sprays to get rid of the moulds on the vines or the grapes. It is a system of working with nature to promote soil health and the natural rhythm of our Planet's life.

Unlike organic viticulture, though, which is basically totally chemical free, biodynamics uses a number of very specific preparations and techniques most of which were outlined in a series of lectures by a bloke called Rudolph Steiner. You have probably heard of Steiner in relation to the Steiner system of education which he introduced in 1924.

Now, Rudolf Steiner - if you Google him - looks just like Jeremy Irons, so if they get around to making a movie about Rudolf Steiner's life soon, they'll probably get Jeremy Irons to play him.

Anyway, for the good health of the earth, Steiner primarily advocated the use of two preparations called Preparation 500 and Preparation 501.

Preparation 500 is where you get some fresh cow manure, you stuff it into a cow's horn and you bury it over Winter. Then, when Spring comes around, you take it out of the ground. You take handfuls of this fermented, super concentrated cow manure compost. You mix it with water. You stir it in a very special way, then, when the moon is in a special place in the sky, you spray this highly diluted cow manure spray onto your soil.

With Preparation 501 you do the same thing but you use ground up quartz. You bury it in a horn over Summer and then you spray that diluted mix in a fine spray over your plants during the summer to attract light forces to your vineyard.

Does it sound whacky so far? It gets even wackier!

There are other preparations, like 502 which are Yarrow flowers, stuffed into a stag's bladder and the stag's bladder is hung in a tree over summer and then tiny, tiny amounts of these preparations are added to the compost pile to help the fermentation and the maturation of the compost and also, according to Steiner, to "bring light forces and cosmic influences onto your land".

Biodynamic farmers also follow the moon calendar. So, for example, today the moon is waning. You should know this from looking at the sky on your power walk earlier this morning! The moon is also in a water sign. So that is the constellation up in the sky that the moon is passing through. This is meant to bring watery influences to bear on the earth so its a good time to plant watery plants like lettuces, for example, but also in the vineyard it would be a good time to leaf pluck because the leaves of the vine are connected to the watery influences of the moon.

All sounds rather strange, doesn't it?

Steiner's ideas are even stranger than that in many ways. He was founder of the Anthroposophy movement - a religious philosophy developed by Steiner from theosophy, holding that spiritual development should be humankind's foremost concern, intended to connect we human beings to our natural environment and thereby to the cosmos.

This is where we come to the answer to Question 1.. What do all those wine producers I mentioned before have in common? Answer: All of them are currently using all or some of the techniques and methods that I have just outlined. They are burying cow horns. They are stirring a bit of poo with some water and spraying it onto their soil.

In Australia, the list includes not only the producers that I mentioned before but also, in the line-up of Award winning wines from this Competition, on those tasting tables across the Ballroom there, you find wines from Delatite, Gemtree, Giant Steps, Innocent Bystander, Howard Park, Kalleske, Krinklewood and Samuel's Gorge. All of those wines were produced using some or all of these biodynamic techniques.

So the question is, why? Have these people lost their marbles? Have I lost my marbles? (Actually, this is quite a common question.) I received an email the other day from a wine producer in Coonawarra. He has been reading what I've been writing about biodynamics on my website and in my magazine articles for a while and he wrote:

"Interesting to see that you're a proponent of the Cult of Biodynamics."

I'd never thought of myself as the 'Tom Cruise' of the wine writing world, but there you go. He went on:

"I'd previously understood that most winemakers undertook a Bachelor of Science Degree. Obviously I've been labouring under a misapprehension, as any scientist worthy of their degree would discount biodynamics as pseudo science and flat out magic. Indeed anyone in possession of a BSc who espouses such flawed philosophy as fact might consider returning their degree."

Now, I thought that this was a fairly hostile reaction. And all of those of you who stuck your hand up and said, "Yes, I've actually done that scientific winemaking training" might want to hand your degree back. That means you, Troy Kalleske (in the audience)!

Why are wine people moving down the biodynamic path? There's one glaringly obvious reason and that's the environmental one. I don't know about you, but I'm actually a little bit scared about what we're doing to the planet and the way we're doing it and how its going to make the life of my children much more difficult than the life I am experiencing now. A lot of vineyard managers, owners and winemakers are thinking the same way.

They want to manage their soil better. They want to use water better. They want to be seen to be doing the right thing but whereas organics for many years has been perceived as a little bit hairy - and the wines produced haven't been all that good - suddenly here's this amazing list of producers that I gave you before, this Club, who are convinced, this is the way to go.

To mangle wine writer Robert Joseph's quote, "It suddenly looks actually quite attractive to be a member of that club. It's almost as though biodynamics has leapfrogged organics and become the respectable face of organics, if you like."

And it also works. There are a number of examples of biodynamics absolutely, unquestionably working.

I was in McLaren Vale a couple of weeks ago. I visited Paxton Vineyards. They've been adopting biodynamic methods for, this is their third season now, and Toby Bekkers, who is the viticulturist there, took me to a vineyard where they've been doing a trial.

So let's say there are 10 rows of Shiraz down this side of the room, and then there are 10 rows of Shiraz down this other side of the room. It's on a single hill. The soil type throughout that hill is absolutely the same. The bit of the vineyard that they've been running conventionally - they've been putting herbicides on it and killing the weeds with chemicals and adding no compost for the last two years - is still quite sandy and quite light in colour.

The soil from the bit of the vineyard over here - so, literally as far as from that side of the room to this side of the room - where they've been adding this stirred poo in water and they've been following the moon calendar and using no chemicals for two years, was darker and richer and stickier. It had more colloidal humus in it.

Anybody who's involved in vineyards will understand what I'm talking about. Anybody who's looked at the soil and understands farming: the biodynamic soil was blacker, it smelt better, it smelt fungal and earthy, it smelt fantastic!

There are a number of really good fundamental practical reasons for adopting biodynamics. Healthier soils means healthier vines, means better quality grapes. It's pretty simple stuff, really. And that's the reason why a lot of people are following biodynamics. They want to grow better grapes.

Now, at this point, people like my Coonawarra correspondent, whom I mentioned before, say - oh well, yeah, that's lovely, but isn't it really just all a marketing gimmick to justify higher prices?

The cynics are around us all the time. But I believe, in well made biodynamic wines, I can taste a difference. I can taste a liveliness on my tongue that really is quite different from conventionally grown wines.

In keeping with Warren's love of music - and jazz in particular - the analogy I use is this: It's like listening to real music. Drinking conventional wines is like listening to music on a CD on the best stereo system. It's enjoyable, it can be good, but it's not a patch on listening if that music was live. It's much more profound and much more rewarding when you're actually in the audience experiencing the moment with all your senses.

And yet, some sceptics still say, "Well, where's the proof?" How can you prove scientifically that these things work?

This is where I go back to part B of my third question, about love. When you fell in love, how did you know? Apparently it is possible to prove that people fall in love. You can do brain scans, you can measure blood pressure, you can look for external signals that the body might be giving out. (I think I might just stop there �)

You can also prove that biodynamics work. You can test for carbon content, test for organic matter, test for soil moisture retention. But that's not the point - when you're in love, you don't need proof! You know that you're in love. And it's the same with biodynamic wine.

The people I speak to in Australia who have adopted these methods in their vineyards, they say: "You know what? It just feels so good. I feel better about the way I'm farming these grapes."

And this brings me back to the third factor in the biodynamic revolution. It really changes the way we think. Biodynamic farmers are encouraged to view their farms holistically, as one whole system, interrelated and connected to the rest of the world. It's not a reductionist scientific view of the world, it's a holistic view.

And I think this resonates in a very strong way with the French concept of terroir. The concept that individual sites are able to speak through the wine into the glass and into our senses. It is the feeling that you can taste a sense of place in these wines.

I see a lot of Australian winemakers moving down this path to achieve that "sense of place" in their wines. Looking at using wild yeasts. Looking at making wines from single patches of vines. In fact, to them, biodynamics looks like a really good way of achieving this highly desirable "sense of place".

There is a great quote from Californian winemaker Randall Grahm, from Bonny Doon Vineyard, which sums this up. He's converted all of his vineyards to biodynamics - and he says:

"Biodynamics is not old wives tales or marketing flim-flam. These practices respect and heal the vineyard and by extension, the earth. While it may not be the only way to grow great wine, I believe it is the royal road to terroir."

Now: last question. Why do you drink wine? I drink wine for a number of different reasons. The alcohol is obviously important, the taste is even more important. But I also drink wine to enrich my life. I drink wine to provide my life with colour, light and shade. And I think that drinking the best biodynamic wines can provide you with more intense, more diverse and more distinct colours.

That's a hard sell, isn't it?

So, I'm just going to leave you with my website address just to continue the theme of the hard sell. www.redwhiteandgreen.com.au

Max Allen
Wine author, journalist and web publisher of www.redhwhiteandgreen.com.au - a guide to biodynamic wines in Australia.