Solar panels power the vineyard, farm and house.
“We aim to make elegant and sophisticated wines with exceptional drinkability & through the evolution of our wine club we also strive to create a real sense of community”
-Adam Elbourne
A boutique winery nestled on the undulating Terra Rossa hills of Pokolbin – the heart & soul of the famous Hunter Valley wine growing region.
With only 4 acres of Chardonnay & 4 acres of Shiraz vines on the home estate, we produce around 200 cases of each of these flagship wines each year. This Limited Release allows us to craft the wines with Premium French Oak, both new & old. The vines are now approximately 35 years of age & are really producing high quality fruit as they are now fully mature vineyards.
In recent years we have tied in a “family” element to these flagship wines, with the the Shiraz now known as the“H.A.E”Shiraz (our son Hugo’s initials) & the Chardonnay named“The Grace”(after our youngest child). Hopefully the legacy & family label lives on well into the future with the next generation at the helm!
We believe in, and practice, regenerative farming processes with a focus on sustainability. Come, look and see for yourself!
In recent years we have begun to work with like minded neighbouring vineyards to produce other premium Hunter Valley grown wines. This includes Verdelho, Vermentino, Sangiovese, Sagratino & Mencia just to name a few. These projects are extremely exciting for us & we strive to maintain our underlying ethos of ethically & sustainability grown wines. A focus on small batch production across our range is essential in creating exclusivity and maintaining quality.
Each year around January/February, we hold a picking ‘luncheon’, where family, friends, members & anyone else who happens to be nearby, help to hand pick the fruit. As the legend of the long lunch that follows continues to grow, the picking seems to be getting a little easier. As they say, many hands make light work!
We hope you share our passion for quality single vineyard Estate wines, and enjoy the ride as we look to continually strive for success from vintage to vintage.
The Winemaker Nick Paterson
Nick Paterson makes our wines and is a highly acclaimed winemaker from the Hunter Valley, known for his skill and passion for producing exceptional wines. He has won numerous awards, including the Riedel 2012 “Hunter Valley’s Rising Star’ and 2011 Citibank NSW Wine of the Year.
Throughout his 19-year career as a winemaker, Nick has had the privilege of learning from some of the legends in the industry, including Murray Tyrell, Len Evans, Iain Riggs and Andrew Spinaze. He has worked for prestigious wineries such as Brokenwood and Tyrrells, and has completed vintages in the Yarra Valley, Tuscany and Campania.
Nick’s wines have received numerous accolades, including 3 Championships, 25 National Trophies, 2 International Trophies and 45 Gold Medals.
As an example our 2012 Chardonnay was rated 95 points (James Halliday) & picked up 2 Trophy Gold medals, and the 2011 Shiraz picked up multiple awards including a 96 point rating. This culminated in the vineyard being rated 5 stars & “Top 10 New Wineries” in the 2018 James Halliday wine companion.
Our Sustainable Practices
Elbourne wines the Home of Sustainability in wine!
Minimizing Our Carbon Footprint
At Elbourne Wines we actually own vineyards and grow the grapes ourselves. But if we don’t grow a variety it is coming off a friends vines. We buy our grapes from 5km around us. Minimizing Food Miles carbon emissions that occur in transport.
A lot of people “spruik” being sustainable to sell wine, but we actually care about the environment and being Carbon Positive!
We only make Hunter wines as we believe a Hunter Valley winery should support its own area. Plus minimizing the carbon footprint of buying grapes from the area. But more importantly we lead the way in growing grapes Sustainably and often host government agencies that come to look at our best practices and innovations.
Come and look to see what we do. Or keep reading.
Biodiversity and Soil Health
The greatest store of carbon is the soil. Not trees, not plants, not oceans or the atmosphere. We are working on our microbes in our soil to create organic carbon rich soils. We are trying to use animals, chickens ducks and geese to manure our soil and improve it. In traditional ways to better the soil. Holistic farming system.
Our flocks of geese, duck and chickens roam our vineyards for pest control plus biodiversity all year round (they thoroughly enjoy eating the grapes too…) Plus spreading manure and seed. The birds mean we don’t need to do pest sprays.
Once the harvest is picked, as otherwise, our Black Suffolk sheep would eat the yummy grapes. The sheep eat the grass, spread seed and poo for the vines. Even better their lanolin in the wool protects the vines from termites. But the story does not end there.
We are now digging in Australian made Worm farms around our vineyards to help the soil plus minimize cardboard waste.
To stop food waste which is one of the biggest releases of methane, third biggest polluter. We collect cheese whey from brilliant local cheesemakers, which is fed to all the animals. We also collect food waste from a lot of the local restaurants to feed our Vineyard chooks. Last but not least, we collect the waste products of Beer, spent grain, to feed our animals and spread onto the vineyards as mulch.
Then, for every case that is sold I am allowed a plant. Once you see our garden you will believe that.
We disagree with ploughing our soils not only losing the topsoil but ploughing releases carbon and water and dries the soil out. Causing more irrigation to the plants and losing the soil microbiota. Ten tones of carbon per acre can be brought back to earth by looking after the soils.
At Elbourne wines we follow regenerative biodynamic and organic principles.
Insects Reintroduction
At Elbourne Wines we have been introducing insects, especially lacewings and ladybugs, back into our vineyards to help the environment and reduce pests. Due to chemicals wiping out the beneficial insects over the years. We have introduced millions of beneficial insects doing a bug breeding program from DPI. Our program promoting predator insects plus predator birds, we don’t have to use pesticides. Keeping our vineyard clean and healthy. By introducing the beneficiary bugs to our vineyard it helps fight pests like scale/aphids and mealy bugs therefore decreasing our use for nasty chemicals which in return helps the native bug population in and around our vineyard.
We also have a diverse plant environment to help establish beneficiary bugs both during growing season and dormancy. We have been planting thousands of native plants in wattle, callistemon and leptospermum, to restore habitats.
We started this program after reading that the global insect population has decreased by 41% in the last 40 years. Now we don’t get brown apple moth, caterpillars, slugs or snails. We were also horrified when a Vet diagnosed our coughing sheep with a lung problem after eating snails in the vineyard. That started our journey of putting large flocks of geese, ducks and hundreds of chooks in our vineyards. Then we learnt most commercial vineyards spend thousands on pest control in sprays.
Also, by bringing biodiversity back, we are increasing our quality and quantity of grapes, plus helping the environment.
Glass Bottles & Recycling
Here at Elbourne wines we realized a long ago, that heavy glass bottles were bad for the environment plus hard to recycle. We couldn’t cut them to make tumblers and the Smash Room wasn’t keen.
Plus our research informed us that heavy glass contributed to 30% to 60% of the carbon footprint of wine. But the problem is, heavy glass bottles are associated with an expensive bottle. We have lost sales due to weight and not enough “punt”, by some wine buyers….
Our new bottles are lightweight and better for the environment.There is no difference in the taste or aging of the wine. The new bottles have minimal punt (bottom of the bottle, today only decorative). Old days the punt was caused by hand blowing the glass…The less punt means we can use the bottles for candles as more room for the wick plus cut to make it into a glass tumbler.
But when a tropical green sea turtle turns up in Tasmania’s Derwent river, we all need to change and do something. Massive heavy bottles take more resources to make, heavier to transport and harder to recycle. Less sand is used to make lighter bottles, which is non- renewable source. So we have switched to lighter, more environmentally friendly bottles to try to help the planet!
Our Sustainable & Regenerative Values!
We enjoy nurturing our vineyard and animals while working with nature. We use regenerative agriculture methods, so as to limit chemical sprays and minimal soil disturbance.
Soil is the most important thing to Earth. Keeping everything healthy. Our vineyard soil is getting fertilized but the rich droppings of our different birds, feeding it naturally for the grape harvest.
- Our flock of sheep live in our vineyard out of season to help minimise tractor work and spraying.
- Our Geese also roam the vineyard to help reduce harmful pests like snails, caterpillars.
- We try to maintain the ground cover to lock up the carbon.
- Each year our wine is unique depending on what Mother Nature gives us. We don’t ‘blend’ or use ‘concentrate’. We are just after that year in the bottle & a true representation of that vintage. Our focus is getting the fruit as great as we can in the vineyard to do minimal wine making.
- For every case of wine sold we sow a plant.
- Solar panels power the vineyard, farm and house.
- Wine bottles are “upcycled” for gifts including scented candles, bath soak sets, tumblers and cheese boards. See our range in theonline store.
Our flock of sheep live in our vineyard out of season to help minimise tractor work and spraying.
We use regenerative agriculture methods, so as to limit chemical sprays and minimal soil disturbance.
