The territory of Mamoiada and in particular the soils of our vineyards are primarily composed of decayed granite (as result of corrosion processes) with small amounts of clay and humus. They are rich in potassium, with a good phosphorous fertility and poor in nitrogen. Our wine production is based on the cultivation of 15 hectares of vineyards trained by the “alberello”-system. The biggest part of the vineyards are cultivated with Cannonau and only a small amount, say 5% of the vineyard surface, is cultivated with a white grape variety which we call “Granazza”. Our wine is cultivated in two different areas of Mamoiada, Muruzzone and Garanunele, both located at an average altitude of 600 metres above sea level. One third of the whole cultivation area is covered with more than 50- year-old plants, one vineyard in particular is 100 years old. The remaining vineyards, also situated in the territory of Mamoiada, are between 3 and 15 years old. The vines are trained by the alberello- technique (bush vines). They are planted close to each other, in patterns of 90 x 170 cm in the older plots (distance between the plants and distance between the lines) and 80 x 200 cm in the younger vineyards. The young alberello-trained vines are stabilized by using trellises to support annual growth. Our new vineyards are cultivated or by mass selection (by grafting the scions of our oldest and best vines) with the aim of preserving biodiversity and the unique character of our Cannonau, or by using Cannonau clones from Sardinia. The winter pruning is done completely by hand, leaving over an average number of 7-9 buds per plant. The vineyards are ploughed twice a year, the hillside ones are still traditionally ploughed by an oxen span and by manual hoeing. 

The vines are not irrigated and organic dung is used only when necessary. When ripening process starts we make a cyclic use of green manure.The summer pruning is also done by hand. For the treatment of the vines we don't use pesticides, if necessary only minimum amounts of sulphur and copper. Treatments are quite limited thanks to the characteristics of our area which results ideal for the cultivation of Cannonau. 
During their lives our old grapevines has been afflicted for the most part by virus so that the plants produce only a limited number of small and well separated grapes. Whereas we might have to do a green harvest in our new vineyards in several years in order to regulate grape yields and to guarantee a better and healthy ripening of the grapes. Our yields: 30 quintals of grapes per hectare coming from our old vineyards, 60 quintals per hectare from the new ones. Grape harvest takes place in October. The grapes are picked by hand and carefully transported to the cellars. About 40% of the grapes we use for our wine-production are purchased from local wine-growers in our neighbourhood. To make sure that our partner-wine growers don't use any pesticides or other inorganic products we supervise all work stages they do in their vineyards. Since we favour biodynamic wine cultivation we are planning to deepen our knowledges in this field. First steps we have already done.

Wine-grower: Giuseppe, 80 years old and Francesco, 47 years old, oenologist and agricultural surveyor.