If you compare the fermentations from the two barrels I’m making this year, the Doctors’ Vineyard (Santa Lucia Highlands) started heating up and dropping brix almost immediately after we pitched the yeast. There was no help required other than 3-4 punch-downs a day to bleed off the heat and keep the fermentation from getting too hot and potentially killing off the yeast (resulting in the horror of a stuck fermentation).

The La Encantada reacted differently. For several days after yeast was pitched, the temperature rose, but the brix barely budged. This meant that the yeast were slowly multiplying as the must came up to cellar temp, but they were fermenting much more slowly.  In the end, the yeast got going, and the fermentation progressed very nicely.

Cheers!  ~Brian