Murcia

Styles

Principal grape varieties

Accessory grape varieties

Terroir

• The vineyards of the main production zones (Bullas, Jumilla, Yecla, Abanilla, and Campo de Cartagena) are situated between 300 and 900 metres above sea level.
• Soils vary considerably by zone, but are generally calcareous in character — deep, moderately permeable, well aerated, and with a good capacity for water retention.
• The low organic-matter content of the soils, combined with their high limestone content, sometimes produces a surface crust that must be broken up mechanically.
• Murcia records 2,900 hours of sunshine per year and a climate broadly comparable to continental, with rainfall that rarely exceeds 300 litres per square metre, distributed unevenly between autumn and spring in the form of torrential downpours.
• Summers are very dry, with temperatures that readily reach 40 °C, while winters are moderately cold and frosts occur only sporadically in certain production zones.
• The municipal territory, of approximately 882 km², is divided from north to south into the Campo de Murcia (part of the Campo de Cartagena district) and the Huerta de Murcia, formed by the Vega del Segura, the two being separated by the southern mountain range.

• Remains of wine presses and winemaking equipment dating from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries have been found, demonstrating that cellars and a developed wine industry existed in the Middle Ages.
• In the second half of the nineteenth century the French market was seeking full-bodied, deeply coloured wines in the wake of phylloxera, which led to the planting of the red variety Monastrell, which met those requirements.
• From the 1980s onwards, cellars were modernised with temperature-controlled fermentation, stainless-steel tanks, and bottling lines, progressively replacing the sale of wine in bulk.

• Red wines produced mainly from Monastrell are broad, fleshy, deeply coloured, and high in alcohol, with a tendency to oxidise rapidly.
• By advancing the harvest date, fresh and lighter-bodied wines are produced, characterised by a delicate fruity character.

• The warm, dry climate combined with the calcareous soils and the Monastrell variety gives the wines — principally reds — high levels of colouring matter and tannins.

Facts drawn from the specification's terroir-link section by automatic interpretation — see the specification (pliego de condiciones).

All appellations in Spain

Sources

• National pliego de condiciones (PDF)
• eAmbrosia register (EU) — File number PGI-ES-A0608