Green fertilizers

Green fertilizers, one of the axes of work to fight against global warming:

Faba bean, forest rye, oats, vetch, squarrosum clover, mustard and many others… At Château Pédesclaux, this mixture of cereals, legumes and crucifers called green manure, is cultivated in organic farming before being sown in our plots at the end of the summer.

Each year, our teams push the work of the vineyard a little further by implanting these seedlings which have several advantages:

• Promote biodiversity in our vineyard and the establishment of a network of mycorrhizae.
• Allow the structuring of the soil by aerating it, which ensures its proper functioning.
• Facilitate the creation of biomass by capturing CO2 and nitrogen from the air. This integrates our vines to the natural cycles of carbon and nitrogen. The creation of this biomass facilitates the supply of nutrients to the vine.

This work is currently done on more than three quarters of our vineyard, and we aim to develop it on the whole property.

The next step is in the spring. When the green manures reach flowering, they will be rolled to create a mulch on the soil.

This technique allows to cover the soil and to limit the development of weeds; to preserve humidity in dry periods, to facilitate the infiltration of water in wet periods, and to protect the soil and the life from oxidation and excessive heat. These effects benefit the soil micro-organisms, maintaining the virtuous circle of a living soil.

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