We are back on the floral track this week the Common Pagoda or Rooistompie in Afrikaans.   We have just a handful of these flowering on the mountain at the moment and they make a spectacular display, so full of colour and full of life. The Sugar and Sunbirds are going crazy for these flowers at the moment.   Now the Mimetes are commonly referred to as the Cowl Pagodas, and are easily identified apart from other Proteas due to their unique flower and leaf shape.  They are some of the most fascinating plant types and the variation between regional colour is amazing.

What sets the Rooistompie apart from other Mimetes is that is the only species in the family to resprout after a fire, every other species of Mimetes will germinate from seed after a fire.  And due to the fire we had about two years ago on this section of the mountain, this particular stand of Pagodas is looking stunning.  We are experiencing a darker red colour in the flowers this season, the reasons are unbeknown to me.

And then trawling through the medicinal or commercial uses of the plants reveals that the bark was used for tanning and the flowers mainly for the cutflower industry.

For more info on this fascinating species of the Protea family please visit Plantzafrica for more info

Hope you enjoyed this week’s installment of Fynbos Friday and have a great weekend.

Bastille has come and gone again, left us a little tired after a cracker weekend in the Hoek, but happy with what we achieved. We have found two nice mentions on the farm on some of the unique things we were offering here. Thank you to the two guys who were kind enough to mention the farm on their blogs.

My Cape Town had this to say:

This was the first year that the Bastille Festival did not clash with the Knysna Oyster Festival which is great for those that enjoy both events (like I do). I’m not sure how this affected the attendance, but I believe it was the busiest festival so far.

It really was the most incredible weather the whole weekend. It was hard to believe we are still in winter. We then moved from the sunny outdoors to the barrel cellar where we tasted several wines direct from the barrel. This is always an interesting exercise, tasing wines at various stages of development and also comparing the impact of different types of wood on the wines. We were also treated to a taste of the as yet unnamed white version of the Gentle Giant. It’s looking very promising.

Then we got a mention on YmartinY for a similar experience.

We started Saturday with a cellar tour and ended it with another unplanned one at Haut Espoir with the Mr Gentle Giant himself treating us to a vertical tasting of his Shiraz’s.

We were Hustlin’… and so were the wines!

The private nature of the tastings we were doing and the ability to take people into the cellar which forms such a part of our lives is unique and stands out. This is personal to us and we like to share that with you.

Thank you to all who made the trip out to our corner of the Hoek, we look forward to seeing you before the next Bastille.

I am sure if you’ve been following us on twitter and Facebook, you might have picked up that were fond of a few things other than fynbos and wine…

Two which we are particularly fond of are beer and sport.

Going into every bottle of Haut Espoir is an element of the team here on the farm. We have a permanent work force of 14 guys who mean alot to us. The core ingredient in the magic we bottle. So this was a day off to focus on taking the team away from the normal routines, and a little bit of an adventure for us all. There was a little football tournament happening in Cape Town at the time. Semi Finals of sorts as well, we believed…

Last-minute-spur-of-the-moment-kind-of-thing we decided to take last Tuesday off and do the fan walk with the team. It being the last day to see the 2010 Fan Walk Cape Town for the big event. Since we had been giving the team off to watch games when they play during the day and since we are just spur-of-the-moment-people, we put raid to moms cottage, put on a boerie roll and had a good old fashioned laugh.

We saw fit to take the guys in to town for the day, which began early with a Puma & Union warm up.

And then on to the fan walk; we made a bee line straight for the stadium, vuvuzelas blasting at around twelve o clock and not stopping until we got there.

On the way we walked through the groves of Just Trees trees; those fever trees really do look stunning outside Truth Coffee.

And then back over the bridge; and this is where it turned really interesting. I thought we would head all the way back down into the heart of town and take in some of the fan fest build up; so we put it to the guys, who were by this stage relatively thirsty after the sprint to the stadium and back, where a unanimous decision was taken to head back to & Union for lunch and a few more #realbeers.

A great day out, and a big hats off to the guys, this is the team that is behind every bottle of wine we produce. Please do not see this as charity, these guys are an intergral part of the family essence of this farm and the entire team that aims to produce the best wines in the world. This was a celebration of an incredible few weeks in this amazing country, South Africa, where we hosted the world in a way that even the world was not quite ready for. The incredible energy that was in every corner, every nook and cranny of every city in South Africa. We felt honored to be able to take the day off and be a part of the experience in the environment it was most real.

Have a great weekend.

Franschhoek’s Bastille Day Festival Celebration is happening again, and because of the winding down of the event that Fifa will not allow me to mention on a public website without paying them for it, we are sure that this year’s festival will be packed to absolute capacity.

All the usual fun activities will be taking place again.

There is the fun run and walk from the Victor Verster Prison. The Franschhoek Wine Valley has throughout the years been linked with the pursuit of freedom, as the destination where the French Huguenots sought refuge from persecution. Aside from the European legacy, the connection with freedom is also evident in a local context with the Drakenstein Prison (formerly Victor Verster), the prison from which the iconic Nelson Mandela was released, situated between Franschhoek and Paarl. This year in particular will be more significant as it commemorates the 20th anniversary of Mr Mandela’s release from the exact prison.

The Franschhoek minstrels will parade through the village on Saturday Morning. There will be the Barrel Rolling Competition where Franschhoek’s Wine Estates take part in rolling Franschhoek’s finest wine barrels to victory.

The ever popular Boules Competition will again take place in fine style as members of the public compete in teams for the coveted title of Boules Champions for 2010. Click here to book by email in the Boules Competition

A farmers’ market, craft market stalls, musicians and children’s activities are also included in the line up of festival celebrations.

So make sure that you book early for the Food & Wine Marquee.
Tickets can be obtained from the Webtickets Website Here.

As usual our video camera will be there to capture all the action of this year’s event.

Coming to the Bastille Festival? Keep an eye on the weather here!!!

We are always excited for the weekend as the tasting room is packed full of jovial folk from the fairest cape and beyond. This year the real Frenchies will no doubt be wanting to celebrate and forget their team’s performance in the World Cup. Let’s hope a Frenchman can take the stage at the Tour de France to reinstate some French pride.

If you want make your way to the farm for a tasting, please be sure to call in advance as it is going to be jam packed all weekend. Make sure to use the contact form in the top banner.

Found this wonderful article over atWineTimes. Have a look at this amazing gadget…

GN Dynamic Sources brings you an amazing tool that will enhance your wine drinking experience. It’s a Wine Temperature Guide. The PVC strip is strapped around the body of the bottle with Velcro and after a few seconds the LCD screen indicates the temperature of your wine. We have designed the product to include the varietals that are South African-specific, such as Pinotage and Méthode Cap Classic (MCC) as well as other popular cultivars such as Sauvignon Blanc, Chenin Blanc, Shiraz, Merlot, Cabernet Sauvignon, along with red blends and white blends. We offer our product in some exciting colours; deep maroon, bottle green, royal blue, silver grey. So it not only tells you what the actual temperature of your wine is, but will also indicate the different temperatures at which each specific type of wine should be enjoyed.

There is also an indication of “room temperature” and the ideal storage temperature for your wine. Why do I need this you might ask? The taste of the wine with all the individual characteristics and flavours is greatly enhanced by drinking it at the right temperature. You might also not be aware of the difference that the correct temperature would make to your drinking pleasure. We would like to make it our aim to educate you with this knowledge so that you can appreciate your wine to the full every single time. Red wines should be consumed slightly chilled as the South African “room temperature” is just too warm. Similarly with white wine, their optimum drinking pleasure is greatly enhanced at different temperatures.

We sometimes leave our white wines in an ice bucket until it is well below its optimum drinking temperature, thereby reducing the effect of the various characteristics that make the various cultivars so different and enjoyable. For our customers that are in the wine, restaurant and retail industry this product will prove to be invaluable to your customer’s tasting experience. Besides the useful function of the Wine Temperature Guide, it can also serve as an advertising tool as it can be branded with logos, website information, contact details, etc.

Furthermore, the packaging can have additional information and advertising strategies printed onto it for maximum effect. To place your order and be one of the first people in the country to have this useful product and wonderful marketing tool, please contact us at gn.dynamicsources@gmail.com or phone Gino on 0767591504. There we have it. This will surely improve everybody’s wine drinking experience. We are excited to try this one out…

This week we venture away from the Floral side, and venture into the fascinating world of Papio hamadryas.   I am very fond of Bobbos.  We get a lot of them on the farm.  Have a look see at our clip on Cellar visitors

There is a massive troop that’s been entertaining itself in the sun on our winery roof every other day. They might be boisterous and cause a bit of damage to the vines, eat our grapes and cause a stir once in a while but we have to realize that we are in their territory so one cannot be too precious about how we treat our faunal neighbours.   The fires of the season have most effectively wiped out the entire food source for the winter months for these guys and I suppose to a certain extent they have had to rely on blocks of chardonnay and shiraz throughout the entire valley.   You may have seen a few articles flying around during harvest season about the baboon raiders, like this one. The Proteas are getting nailed as well, they are especially fond of the sugarbushes right now, suppose that sweet nectar is too much to resist.

Baboons around the country vary massively in terms of colour variation, depending on age, sex, and geography.  Our Cape Chacma’s tend to be quite dark and somewhat larger in general than other baboons around SA.  Their upper canines are strongly developed, with the length in old adult males reaching up to 60 mm.    These canines are massive, and as sharp as a razor blade.   I would not like to see the business end of an aggravated male that’s for sure.  I don’t even think my newly acquired Muay Thai skills would be much of a help against a strong willed big male.    The average troop size is 40, the largest can be up to 130, and they do travel.  Their home range can be anything up to 30 kilometres sq.

And I especially enjoyed this piece on the diet from Skinner et al. The Mammals of the Southern African Subregion “Food: they are omnivorous, feeding primarily on fruit, leaves and invertebrates throughout the year.  DeVore and Hall (1965), for instance, stated that it is simpler to list the items not eaten by baboons than to describe the items they do eat. “

And if you haven’t seen this yet, look out for  Eric in Its a piece of cake.  Its an awesome book for the kiddies.  James is utterly fascinated with Eric and requests this as his bedtime story more than any book right now.   Love the Carrot cake vibe there.   For some interesting facts and a great read follow African Penguin on Twitter

And please take time to visit Baboon Matters and get involved, take a walk with them, sign the petition.  The Bobbos need our help.

It’s an absolute privilege to live where we do, which is something we never take for granted. There are moments every single day which catch us unaware and remind us of how magical this little slice of heaven is. Today we wanted to share some random images which Rob loves taking so much.  A mere sliver into the magic that is Haut Espoir.

Please do not forget to keep checking in with us here, as well as on Twitter, Facebook or our Posterous page. We are continuously updating all of them.

See you all tomorrow for Fynbos Friday. In the meantime, flip through the images and have a great afternoon.

When word came about that Jamie Who had chosen our `06 Gentle Giant as his wine of the week, we were all very happy. We are an avid follower of his and were very pleased when he was recently nominated as one of 200 South Africans you should be taking to lunch. Preferably get him into your kitchen and have a bag of organic stuff ready for him to cook for you as the man is passionate about his food! Herewith his review:

The first time I tasted this wine it was from a bottle that I had won. Some dude called Rambowine was having a competition on Twitter where you had to identify a restaurant’s bathroom from a photo he had taken with a cellphone. I ended up guessing Reuben’s in Franschhoek and 24 hours later I was holding a bottle of the Gentle Giant 2006 from Haut Espoir. Lovely…

Cheers,
Jamie Who

We say thank you, and yes, ribeye will be on the menu for us soon. Our choice of a place to get your fresh goodies to accompany the meal would have to be Kwalapa. They are an amazing venture. More on that later…

My first exposure to this tree was in my final year of Archaeology at UCT.  The reason it is important to archaeologists is because the Clanwilliam Cedar has been around for a while. A long while.  The largest specimens ring circumference was 11 metres.  That massive!  Useless fact, that the Cederberg is actually named after this tree.

It was some years later at Bushmanskloof that I met Bruce, and in the Cederberg itself where my passion for all things Fynbos really kicked off.  A lot of gin and a few years later, Bruce is still a good friend and we use his handy work with Carl and the team from Just Trees…which brings me back to this weeks Fynbos Friday.  When I received the invite to go and put the Cedar back into the Cederberg, wild horses could not keep me away from the chance to actually go and plant a Clanwilliam Cedar tree.     And then swing into Cederberg wines and clean out the cellar,  managed to pick up a few bottles of Dawid’s 2006 Chardonnay; heaven!  And the 2010 Bukketrabe is something to watch out for, very delicious wine.

Just Trees plant the seedlings, which, once they are size wise able to handle the Cederberg climate; they go to CNC and on weekends such as this one, you get to walk out to the middle of the brilliant Cederberg and plant back one of our critically endangered tree species.

The following from the Red Cedar project here on Red Espresso “Whilst there were forests of these beautiful trees, there are now hardly any to be seen. Conversion of large tracts of land for agriculture, fires and indiscriminate felling for furniture and telephone poles have almost wiped out the Cedars entirely – to the extent that the species is classified as endangered on the global Red Data List and faces high risk of extinction.   In 1987 Cape Nature started an initiative to restore the Cedar Tree by replanting nursery-grown seedlings into the wild and, to date, they have replanted over 500 Cedar Trees back into the Cederberg.

We became aware of the plight of the Cedar on one of our visits to the Cederberg and decided to do something with our sister company Just Trees, a wholesale nursery, we have partnered with Cape Nature, and through our Red Cedar Project, have committed to planting 1 000 Cedars into the Cederberg every year, which is three times the  number of trees planted since 1987.  Every year we will replant our Cedar trees back into the wild, where they will be cared for by Cape Nature in an effort to restore the Clanwilliam Cedar- and the Cederberg- to its original glory.  “

We have planted a lot of Just Trees’s trees here on the farm,  and there are going to be a lot more planted over the years.    Planting trees has to be one of the greatest boosts a local eco system can get.  Trees are at the peak of the pyramid, they provide so much food and shelter and great vibes.   And nothing beats planting a tree then having a stiff shot of the good red stuff.  Good times.  Thanks to Carl and Bruce and everyone involved, and a special thanks to Rika from Cape Nature Conservation, without people like her we would be in a worse state environmentally worldwide.  If you would like to read more about the project please read right here:  Partnership puts the Cedar back into the Cederberg

We are dealing with large group of Fynbos here, so I felt it suited the theme this week to focus on the family rather than focus on one specific Species.    Euryops form part of the Daisy family, or Asteraceae.  They are fun to identify as there are so many forms yet they all have somewhat common features.  There is such an amazing diversity in this family.     What we are looking at in the photo, apart from the creepy crawly, is the Euryops’s, more commonly known as the Daisie.  Eurys in Greek means Large, and ops, means eye.   According to my identification guide because of the common feature which is a large flowerhead.

I don’t find many references to medicinal or traditional uses for the plant other than in the early days it being used as a substitute for gum, what I would like to focus on this week, is the most often overlooked portion of Fynbos that tends to turn most people away.  It’s the small little creepy crawlies which are so critical for the importance of any biome that make the most difference in my opinion.

I was going to insert another photo of a Euryops with a worm on, but they are the one insect that I am not a huge fan of, I would like to focus on the other insect, the much more interesting spider in the photograph.  The spider is Thomisidiae Thomisus, or Small Crab Spider.  They have the ability to slowly change colour depending on what flower they are sitting on.  Masters of the ambush technique, and spiders which do not spin webs, they spend most of their lives on plants, waiting patiently for the next meal.  According to my Southern African Spiders identification guide (Filmer, 91):

They appear sluggish and lethargic- only to be transformed into a flash of movement as they pounce on and over prey that strays too near.  They rely on touch rather than sight to capture their prey; and on their stillness and coloration to protect them from predators.  They are formidable spiders and will attack insects and other spiders much larger than themselves.  They have a potent venom which can kill a bee within seconds.  Holding the prey in their chelicerae (that’s a fancy name for spider fangs) they literally suck it dry, discarding the empty shell of the insect.

So the next time you are planning on either getting up close and personal for a good sniff or potentially pick any flowers; be warned that you could be getting more than you bargained for.  While their venom is not harmful to humans there is no way I want those chelicerae getting anywhere near me or my nose thank you very much.

http://www.plantzafrica.com/plantefg/euryopsannuus.htm

http://www.plantzafrica.com/plantefg/europchrysan.htm