Saint Martin's day on 11 November marks the symbolic end of the grape harvest season, and the beginning of a new wine-growing year. The vines shed their leaves, the sap rises and the vines retire to their winter quarters for the next four months.
The sap starts to bead at the branch-ends in early spring. Some twenty to thirty days later the buds open, and the blossom only appears in June at a time when the vine is particularly susceptible to bad weather.
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