Domaine de la Bonne Tonne - Thomas & Anne Laure Agatensi
Our Family Estate is located in the hamlet of Morgon, at the foot of the Py coast.
It covers an area of vineyards of around 7 hectares spread over the Morgon, Régnié and Beaujolais Blanc appellation.
The vines have been cultivated in organic farming since 2003, we have also been developing biodynamic cultivation on the estate for about ten years and will apply for demeter or biodyvin certification within 2 to 3 years. Our treatments in the vineyards consist only of a little sulfur, copper, and herbal teas as well as biodynamic preparations (500P; 501 ...)
We do regular plowing in our plots with one of my grandfather's first tractors. Very light tractor that does not compact the soil too much. The goal for us is to follow a horse-drawn plowing training in spring 2021.
Plowing in our vines is light and is practiced on the surface in order to limit natural grass cover without damaging the soil. Sometimes manual weeding is necessary to limit this weeding when it is too important.
From pruning to harvesting, all the work in the vineyard is carried out by us, except for the harvest where we recruit staff.
The size of our vines is meant to be respectful of the vine and therefore, non-mutilating. It lasts about 4 months.
The various green jobs carried out after the pruning season are:
-Manual de-sucking
- lifting of the vine: which consists in binding the young branches of the year together so that they do not fall to the ground, Tying carried out with rattan,
-The shearing of the vine is intended to be manual to control a sufficient height and thus respect the photosynthesis of the vine.
-The leaf stripping which consists of removing the leaves in front of the grapes located on the rising sun side in order to allow aeration of the vine without favoring the roasting of the still fragile grapes.
Finally, the grapes are harvested during the harvest by hand with a spruce tree.
The harvest thus harvested is then transported in boxes to be placed in the cold for 24 hours before being vatted in our cellar to ferment there. In our vats, we do not destemmer. The entire cluster is therefore used. The grapes thus ferment for 15 to 20 days depending on the vintage, before being pressed. We carry out some pumping over in the bucket during this period. There are no chemical yeasts used but only indigenous yeasts. No suffering either. Our vinifications are natural. Once the grapes are pressed, we enter our future wines in barrels or demi-muids of 400 and 600 l so that they finish their fermentation and according to the aging we wish to bring them. Some wines are aged in concrete vats and are then blended with the wine aged in barrels.
We also make micro-cuvées in 400 liter demi-muids where we de-stem the harvest in order to let the berries ferment directly in the barrel. Then, we press these berries manually with a wooden mini-press called American. We re-enter the juice obtained so that the fermentation ends in barrels.
The aging time of our wines varies depending on the year and our taste. It can range from 6 months to 1 or even 2 years, depending on the vintage.
Sometimes, we add a little sulfur just before bottling (in the order of one / two grams / hl) depending on the year and the organoleptic characteristics of the wine,
For our cuvées, we have chosen to do only plot, in other words, we vinify plot by plot and we do not mix them. The important thing for us is to respect the typicity of the soils of our plots.
We are also working with “Climats” on our Morgons. The Morgon appellation has 6 in total and we have 3. These climates correspond to different terroirs of the appellation. We thus have the Morgon climat "Grands-Cras", the Morgon climat "Les Charmes" as well as the Morgon climat "Côte du Py".
Our Domain does not engage in trading activities.