Twisted Pines Farm & Vineyard

Some of us are tiny, while others are toony. We're all invading your newsfeed to declare our readiness for adventures in new pastures.

🪿Sebastopol goslings - 4 months and younger
🪿Sebastopol x French Toulouse (production variety) goslings - 6 weeks and younger
🪶Guinea fowl - 6 weeks and younger
🐮Highland bulls - 6 months and older

Sometimes vineyard ownership means camping out under the light of a full moon while babysitting the burn barrels set to fight the early spring frost.

When the girls lay infertile eggs, you blow them out for future projects and make a scrambled egg bake for the animals.

It doesn't take an April Fool to realize it's way too early in the season to feel confident the Shenandoah Valley will be frost free the next two months. Dornfelder doesn't seem to care - just look at those buds!

Looks like we'll be watching temps closely for the next couple months! 👀

Meet our newest ball of buff fluff, and first sebbie gosling of the season, who charmed us with a St. Patrick's Day arrival ☘️

Aptly named Lucky, not only for the day it zipped out of the shell but also because:
- It was the only viable egg of the (4 egg) batch that went into the incubator.
- During lockdown, human mom left town without turning the humidifier on in the hatcher. Coming home after 48h to see 15% humidity is not a good thing for a species that likes to hatch in +80% RH.
- In a frenzy to correct the humidity, human mom opened the lid, realizing a little too late that the gosling had already pipped externally. Doing so increased its chances of becoming shrink wrapped inside the eggshell.

This little one reminded us that even when the path taken is fraught with wrong turns, it is still possible to find that pot of gold at the end of the rainbow!

☘️

Mama Potato says calving this little one was easy as 🥧

Wishing everyone a fabulous π day as we celebrate the newest addition to the farm!

This handsome Sebastopol gander will soon unite with his new flock.

If you're in the market for geese, we currently have several adult Sebastopol ganders to select from. As spring approaches, we suspect we will soon also have goslings available.

Wrapped up a day of pruning in the vineyard by spying our first Sebastopol egg of the 2024 season. Keeping our fingers crossed we'll be welcoming that early spring Punxsutawney Phil foretold with some buff goslings!

If anyone is looking for unique chicken breeds, check out Groovy Broody's. They are located in Hampton Roads, though Twisted Pines Farm & Vineyard is happy to transport some of these lovies to the Staunton area anytime we're down that way, including next weekend May 6th.

Today's April showers are good not only for the vineyard but also for finding a surprise nest of goose eggs.

Sebastopol geese have a short breeding season that extends from late winter to early spring. Sebastopol females are notorious for going broody after their first clutch of a dozen or so eggs, at which point that's often it for the season. However, if the female has an unsuccessful hatch (e.g., when humans transfer eggs from nest to incubator), they may try again.

After a ~2-month break from laying, sitting on an empty nest, and raising a foster gosling, our grey goose Penny has started a second clutch for this spring 2023 season. We're looking forward to meeting some new goslings at the end of May!

Hey Bud!!!!!

Spring is sprouting all types of critters here on the farm. Calves, goslings, and two kings of the mulch pile, just to name a few!

Meet Stretch and Armstrong, the first Sebastopol goslings of the 2023 Twisted Pines Farm & Vineyard hatching season!

Winter got you down?

We'll pick you up!!!

These three handsome Sebastapol ganders will be off and away to new homes this weekend!

After a few months hiatus from working in the vineyard, today's weather was a perfect excuse to prune these young vines into shape in preparation for the 2023 growing season!

What better way to ring in the new year than with a Sebastopol gosling of your very own. Reach out to us for more information!

Today marks another first for us - twistedpinesvineyard.com is now live!

If you're in the market for cattle, we currently have a black medium-frame highland bull and a yellow highland bull calf (available in February). More information, including photos, are available on our webpage.

If you're in the market for geese, we currently have Sebastopol goslings aged 2 months and younger. More information, including photos, are available on our webpage.

If you're in the market for wine, stay tuned!

Regardless of what you're in the market for, please take the opportunity to learn a bit about us and what our farm has to offer.

In addition to grapes and geese, we also raise Scottish Highland cattle. This is Cyclops, our special needs heifer. She has gland issues in her eyes that typically leave her eyes looking very cloudy. However the gorgeous weather we've been enjoying this weekend has allowed her gland swelling to reduce, so we can see her beautiful baby blues. Here she is enjoying some delicious carrots and broccoli.

As our time in the vineyard winds down for the 2022 season, you can find us enjoying the crisp fall days tending to our flock of Sebastopol and Tufted Toulouse geese.

From vines to juice, our first harvest of Gewürztraminer is in the books!

The grape clusters playing peek-a-boo ahead of some Sunday afternoon rain showers.

Amazing the difference consistent rain makes. Around this time last year we were excited that our newly planted vines had tiny buds like in photo 1. After multiples days of rain this month, many of our Dornfelder and replants look like the second photo.

Spring rain 🌧️ is a good thing!

We're happy to report that Cinco de Mayo 2022 wraps up our vineyard planting for the season. Our 2021 plants are enjoying the beautiful spring weather (confirmed by the Malbec vine pictured below) and the 2022 plants are getting off to a great start.

The humans are looking forward to the forced break that the impending rain will bring, allowing us to celebrate our winemaker's milestone birthday (40!) on Friday and Mother's Day on Sunday. We'll be back at it next week as we get to work on the trellis installation for dornfelder.

We're in the final stretch of planting. Just 11 rows and roughly 1000 vines to go. Consider joining us to help with the planting and perhaps collect a few fancy rocks along the way. More info available in our events section for Saturday and Sunday.

We are wondering where the rain is that was forecast for today, as these little ones could use some April showers to bring May buds.

We're out here planting today, until 4:30 or until it starts raining. Come visit, lend a hand, and learn more about what we're doing here at Twisted Pines Vineyard. (More info in our events section)

Our buds are starting to leaf out!

We're out here planting daily from 8-5 through May 1st. Come check them out for yourself. More information is available in our Upcoming Events section.

Over the next two weeks, we'll be hand planting our newest varietal, Dornfelder, replacing the 2021 vines that didn't fare the drought conditions, setting up the trellis system, and any number of other things that go into ensuring our vines get off to a great start. The weather is shaping up to be beautiful and we'll be out daily from 8-5 through May 1st. We'd love to have you join us for a bit to see what it's all about.

We're offering "TPV bucks" to those that help. They'll be good toward purchases within our future tasting room.

Nothing like 1+ inches of snow covered ground to help mentally prepare for the week ahead. Dornfelder arrives tomorrow and the first of them will meet Twisted Pines Vineyard soil on Wednesday so long as the weather cooperates, the snow is melted, and the ground isn't frozen.