Regenerative Practices in our Vineyard and Forests

Anyone visiting Seavey will hear about our land and ecosystem as well as our wines. Without calling attention to it, founders Bill and Mary Seavey believed in creating a balanced ecosystem that does not stress the land nor its precious underground water resources. Rather than aggressively expanding our grape farming, they kept our farmed acreage proportional to our modest wine production facility and created valuable virtuous circles of recycling and reuse. At harvest time, for example, our beef cattle are enlisted to digest huge amounts of grape rachis, and for years the Seaveys have created long composting rows using grape pomace, oak leaves, biochar, cow manure, and green waste.

In 2003, Seavey installed one of the first winery solar projects in Napa Valley on top of an old barn roof adjacent to the winery that met most of the electricity requirements of our tank room and cave. Thirteen years later, in 2016, we installed a much larger solar array that generates enough solar power to support 85 percent of our electricity requirements.

Seavey also engages in a number of regenerative agricultural and forest management practics, including the application of 750 tons of compost to the vineyard in the last two years alone, the use of animals (sheep, cattle and goats) throughout the vineyard and forests, the extensive generation and use of biochar, no-till and limited till farming, use of electrical as opposed to gas powered equipment where possible, and the operation of a large worm farm. We also carefully steward and mitigate wildfire risk in our 150 acres of ancient oak woodlands, which are the most biodiverse ecosystem in California.

The end result? Wine that is produced in a manner that not only sustains the land but in fact regenerates it.