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WINEMAKING NA VIGA TION Pascal Chatonnet believes that TCA contamination is taking place during the drying process for French oak staves, though no one is sure. offers his own distinctive analogy: "Serial killers are not a major source of homicides." One possible reason why barrel-tainted wine has not shown up in the marketplace, at least not in any volume, is that TCA con- tamination is fairly easy to sniff out in the winery. Winemakers and cellar staff use their own sensory equipment to spot suspect barrels long before they have samples go through laboratory test- ing. This may entail dumping some wine, but there is less likeli- hood that the moldy taint will head for the shelves. Genuine cork taint, by contrast, only shows up after bottling. But even with this final line of defense, TCA-infested barrels are clearly something coopers need to worry about. Aren't they? Vinters_GrapePress_Jun09.qxp 5/8/09 11:47 AM Page 1 BUY YOUR NEXT GRAPE PRESS MEMBRANE FROM A COMPANY THAT KNOWS PRESSES! Cooperage practices The suggestion that cooperages are asleep at the switch is un- doubtedly what has them most peeved. Singly and collectively, the major French cooperages insist that they have been on top of the problem for years, working on it vigilantly, and that they certainly know as much about barrel TCA as Chatonnet. Besides the work undertaken by the Federation of French Coopers, individual cooperages have run their own research and imposed their own controls during the past few years. "My two cooperages (Taransaud and Francois Frères)," says Mel Knox, "have gotten religion, gotten to work." He says that in 2001 Taransaud started to take protective measures: They stopped buying wood from anyone who also made wood for construc- tion work, since that could be contaminated by sprays. Wood coming into the yard is quarantined and tested first, and the cooperages have TCA air traps. They also test for TCA in ship- ping containers. Bruno Remy, sales manager for Canton Cooperage, which is owned by Taransaud, says that it's a nightmare to find the source of TCA contamination, but that Taransaud, Canton and their Hungarian affiliate have gone to some lengths to develop tech- niques and controls. "Besides the staves, we check the heads, too. For every barrel, we have a tracking system for every part. We track the bungs, the packaging and the flour paste that holds the heads on. We test all the containers for shipping." "We've been working on this for years," says Francois Pel- tereau-Villeneuve of Seguin-Moreau, even working for a time with Chatonnet and Excell. "Since 2006 we have instituted dras- tic specifications for all our suppliers—for wood, for metal, for anything that comes into the cooperage. We audit those suppli- Vintners Supply Company has been supplying replacement wine press membranes since 1996. Our membranes are manufactured in Germany by technicians with years of experience in manufacturing and servicing grape presses.We stock replacement membranes for most any make and model of grape press. Please contact us for a no obligation quote. If we do not have it, we can make it! 2 Barrel Washers • 4 Barrel Washers Barrel Processing Lines • 1/2 Ton Bin Washing Systems 35 lb. Picking Lug Washers • Custom Cellar Equipment Toll Free: 800-366-6809 • Fax: 707-584-7955 E-mail: membranes@vintnerssupply.com www.vintnerssupply.com St. Helena, CA 94574-0153 P.O. Box 153 Tom Beard Company 1650 Almar Parkway, Santa Rosa, CA 95403 P. 707-573-3150 www.tombeard.com QSEE US AT UNIFIED, BOOTH #510 F. 707-573-3140 E. jmendoza@tombeard.com QSEE US AT UNIFIED, BOOTH #519 Wines & Vines JAnUARY 2011 121