Club Newsletter August 2025

What a busy month it has been here in the white mountains. We’re really excited for Fall and can’t wait to share our final traditional club Fall Release wines with you! This special selection might include some of your favorites from before, along with some new wines that we think you’ll really enjoy trying for the first time. Keep an eye on your inbox; the announcement is coming very soon. We also announced the 2025 Fall Event Weekend.

It’s been wonderful to see more and more of you visiting our tasting room, Birch Room, and enjoying our outdoor patio. We also had an amazing time celebrating our 15 year anniversary on a wine sail out on Casco Bay in Portland, Maine. We’re getting more comfortable with organizing trips like these and would love for you to join us on our next adventure!

BRAND NEW at Seven Birches Winery! The Adopt A Wine Lot program invites our most passionate customers and existing club members to be involved in the process of creating a finished wine lot, by getting exclusive design and naming rights to the label, while sampling/tasting the wine during its aging process. For more info, click below. For detailed information on how to adopt and pricing, click here.

The Cellar here at Seven Birches/ Rhythm Cider is in full swing this summer. We just finished bottling our new Alto, Savanna, Tempranillo, and Pinot Noir. I’m very excited about bringing these to all of you; they are fantastic end of summer/ beginning of fall wines. This year’s Savanna may be one of my favorites that we have ever produced. Our next canning run is set up for September 2nd. We will be canning our next batch of Rhythm, Blueberry, Honey, and Rose ciders. Mark picked up a little over 1300 pounds of fresh picked blueberries from Windy Ridge Orchard in North Haverhill New Hampshire this week. These will be made into our 2025 Blueberry wine, and this year’s harvest looks absolutely fantastic. We will be getting this ferment going in the next couple of days. Speaking of ferments; cider sales statewide have been upticking all summer and we have had to bring in more fresh pressed sweet apple cider to continue our hard cider production through the summer. We are excited to announce our new partnership with Ricker Hill Orchard in Turner Maine. Ricker Hill is the newest orchard added to our already phenomenal line up of apple producers of New England. These include Applecrest Farm in Hampton Falls, Windy Ridge Orchard in New Hampshire and Giles Farm in Maine. I am extremely proud to be working with all these orchards, which are all multi generational farms. On top of all of all that, Gage and I are continuing to tend the vineyard out back of the RiverWalk. We have just finished hedging all the rows which involves pruning any growth above the top wire. This process is important in order to avoid the tall, unsupported shoots buckling under their own weight. Also at this point in the season more leaf growth is unnecessary and will steal nutrients from the bunches of grapes. We are now moving into leaf pulling. Leaf pulling involves removing leaves from around the grape clusters. By removing the excess leaves in this area we increase air flow through the vine. This will reduce the need to spray the vineyard and help prevent diseases naturally. It is also important to expose the grape clusters to additional sunlight. By the grapes getting more sun it will increase the flavors in the grapes we would like to promote and suppress the ones we don’t. However, our largest reason is when the clusters are exposed to additional sunlight they will create more sugars in the grapes! The last thing I am extremely proud and excited about is our new collaboration cider with Woodstock Brewery called RhythmStock Cider. We will be producing their fall cider this year for #CiderSeason and I couldn’t be more thrilled with it so far. It will be an off dry/semi-sweet version of our New Hampshire Dry Cider. This cider will be made from our 2023 New Hampshire Dry Cider which has spent almost two full years in French oak barrels. It was lightly back sweetened with fresh pressed sweet cider from Ricker Hill Farm, and finally it will be lightly dry hopped with one of Peter’s, the head brewer at Woodstock, favorite hops. Dry hopping is the process of adding hops to a beverage after fermentation. By doing this we will only be adding floral and botanical notes to the cider and no bitterness. Woodstock Brewery is a staple of the White Mountains and we could not be more proud than extending this collaboration across the Pemigewassett river and truly connecting these two towns, two beverages, and two businesses together. The RhythmStock cider will be hitting tap lines for Labor day 2025. We are looking forward to seeing you the next time you visit the White Mountains. Be well, be safe, and may the sun always be on your face, the wind at your back, and a delicious cider or wine in your hand.