Breggo Cellars Gewurztraminer

Breggo means "sheep" in Boontling, in honor of our place, a 203-acre farm just north of Boonville. Our Craftsman house from the 1920s and random cluster of sideways-tilting outbuildings recently served as headquarters to one of the oldest and largest sheep ranches in Anderson Valley. For 150 years, sheep dominated the agricultural landscape of Anderson Valley. Sheep, like the domesticated vinifera grapevine, occupy and even thrive on the geographic periphery - places too steep, with soils too thin and climates too cold for other types of intensive agriculture. Sheep and vines flourish where the domesticated meets the wilderness. The margins. This is our place.

About 30% of the property constitutes what winegrowers might call "usable" ground: islands of open grassy slopes, on reasonably stable clay-loam soils, with gentle southeastern exposures.