Argentina’s 2020 vintage will always be one to remember — both for quality and also for the strange circumstances. The 2020 Argentina harvest was the vintage of COVID-19, with quarantine coming into effect in mid-March before the wine grape harvest was over, but it was also one of the earliest vintages on record (which may well have been a blessing in disguise!)

Argentina vintage report 2020: Mendoza & San Juan

One of the earliest and warmest vintages on record, Mendoza’s 2020 harvest was brought forward by around a month in most cases. “2020 will undoubtedly be remembered for the strict logistics involved in harvesting the grapes in a very short period of time due to the explosive increases in sugar ripening!” says Juan Pablo Murgia, Chief Winemaker at Bodega Argento. “The harvest was between two weeks and a month earlier than normal.”

With low rainfall throughout the season (down by 70% in some regions), a cool and dry winter followed by a hot summer, and yields down by around a quarter, maturation happened much quicker than normal in the vineyard. For white grape varieties the harvest was around two weeks early but in the case of some red grape varieties it was over a month early.

“It was one of the earliest and most challenging vintages logistically that we’ve ever had at Viña Cobos,” says Head Winemaker Andrés Vignoni. “The combination of almost no winter snow and the hydric stress with a very warm and dry summer meant that the grape berries were very small and ripened very quickly. We also had some frost and hail in specific zones in the Uco Valley, including Gualtallary, La Consulta, Altamira and San Pablo, which also reduced yields quite abruptly.”

“Ripening accelerated very quickly and some of our red varieties were 40 days ahead of normal,” adds Vignoni. “Which meant you had to pick at the right moment in order to get good acidity and mature tannins and condense harvest dates in order to avoid any overripe grapes.”

By picking early, winemakers are very pleased with the results.

“The quality was fantastic!” says Martin Kaiser, of Doña Paula in Luján de Cuyo. “Because of this very dry and warm climate, the red grapes developed into very concentrated and expressive wines; and in the case of the white wines, we have very good varietal expression.”

Although some of the later-cycle red varieties, like Cabernet Sauvignon, were more challenging this year in terms of balancing phenolic development with sugar accumulation, the early and medium-cycle reds performed very well. Nonetheless, careful maceration was key to good quality:

“The red wines from this vintage will be remembered for their high quality due to high levels of polyphenols, with bluish hues in their colours even in more reddish varieties, such as Cabernet Franc,” says Juan Pablo Murga of Argento. “The aromatic profile remains fresh and fruity, since there was no over-ripening of the aromatic precursors and polyphenols, despite the high levels of sugar. At the same time, the acidity levels remained fairly balanced, so the fermentations occurred with good pH levels and the development of fruity aromas. Extraction during maceration is a critical factor in this harvest, because over-extraction can be tough when working with highly reactive tannins and highly concentrated grapes. 2020 will undoubtedly be known for great and wines with long ageing potential.”

San Juan followed a similar trend with a harvest much earlier than normal, with white wines being picked in mid-January, and required careful logistics in the winery.

Patagonia: Argentina Harvest Report 2020 in Río Negro, Neuquén & Chubut

In Neuquen and Río Negro the vintage was also incredibly early this year — over a month early for most — which followed on from a cold winter and cool spring.

“We had a really cold winter, with some very intense frosts, in fact — some nights were below -11ºC!” recalls the winemaker at Bodega Miras, Marcelo Miras, who has been making wine in the south for over 30 years.

“Spring was also dry and cool with some light frosts. In summer, however, the temperatures soared and remained warm for the whole season — which brought forward the harvest by about a month in most varieties. The quality of the fruit, though, was excellent, with perfect health and a good maturation of sugars while maintaining good natural acidity.”

In Chubut, the year got off to a normal start but even this – the coolest wine region in Argentina -also experienced a warm summer. “The summer was warm and much drier but also much windier, causing some of our shoots to break and plants to stall growth,” says Sofia Elena, winemaker at Contra Corriente. “There was no frost at all during all months of summer and the weather was quite warm and dry until early autumn. By the beginning of April, frost events started happening quite often but we reached a good level of ripeness by the end of April, when we harvested to get ahead of the rain.”

Calchaquí Valleys: Argentina Harvest Report 2020

A cooler, cloudier and slightly wetter summer season meant that the harvest in the Calchaquí Valleys in northern Argentina was much closer to normal dates. However, due to its more northerly latitude, the harvest tends to come earlier than in the Cuyo region further south and wine production was not overly complicated by COVID-19 restrictions.

Producers are equally as optimistic about quality: “Grapes ripened a bit slower than usual, but the reds are very promising and our white wines will be fresher than other years,” says Thibaut Delmotte, winemaker at Colomé.