Vinous

AOC · Appellation profile

Malepère

44,370 haProduction zone
3Wines in the rules
17.3 °CGrowing season · warm
IIWinkler region

What is made here

Wine colours

Colours the rules allow. Pick a colour to filter the rules and grapes below.

Where it is

Malepère in France

Latitude
43.1°–43.3° N
Vineyard altitude
112 m to 312 m
Delimited vineyard land
8,386 ha

The delimited vineyard parcels themselves, so the shape is patchy: only land within them may grow the wine. Boundary: INAO parcel delimitation (Licence Ouverte); nearby parcels drawn as one block, with less detail for larger appellations. Country outlines: Natural Earth. Dots on the zone map are the vineyard points used for climate.

Showing every colour The colour filter changes the rules and grapes. Climate, vintages and soils describe the vineyards, so they stay the same.

01 · What the law says

The rules

Limits on grapes, yields, ripeness and ageing that every wine labelled Malepère must meet.

3 wines in the rules, all colours.
WineMain grape(s)Max yield
t/ha
Max wine
hl/ha
Yield ceiling
hl/ha
Grape ripeness
min. % pot. alc.
Sugar
max. g/l
Malepère Merlot–60–––
Malepère 40% Merlot9506012–
Malepère rosé 40% Cabernet Franc95060124

From the official production rules (cahier des charges). Hover a figure to see the clause it comes from. A dash means the rules set no figure, or it is not captured yet.

Blend rules

Malepère

  • ≥ 40% Merlot · Main grape
  • ≥ 20% cabernet franc / cot · Allowed
  • – cabernet-sauvignon / cinsaut / grenache / lledoner pelut · Allowed

; release from 1 March of the year after the harvest.

Blend rules

Malepère rosé

  • ≥ 40% Cabernet Franc · Main grape
  • ≥ 20% cabernet-sauvignon / cinsaut / cot / grenache / merlot · Allowed

Other varieties allowed

Besides the main grapes, the rules allow these varieties in some wines. Grape names link where a profile exists.

6 varieties · Malepère, Malepère rosé

Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cinsaut, Grenache, Lledoner Pelut, Malbec

5 varieties · Malepère

Cabernet Sauvignon, Cinsaut, Grenache, Malbec, Merlot

In the vineyard and cellar: rules for every wine

4,000
Vines per hectare, minimum
Training
Systems allowed
gobelet; cordon de Royat; taille Guyot simple (cot, merlot, cabernet franc, cabernet-sauvignon)
Permitted
Irrigation

02 · Climate fingerprint

The climate

The growing season averages 17.3 °C, warm on Gregory Jones's scale, with 1,567 growing degree days (Winkler II).

The average year  1991–2020, vineyards at about 226 m

Monthly mean, °CRain, mmGrowing season
5.5° 79 Jan 6.0° 65 Feb 8.9° 69 Mar 11.4° 82 Apr 15.0° 77 May 19.0° 54 Jun 21.6° 40 Jul 21.7° 46 Aug 18.2° 55 Sep 14.2° 72 Oct 9.2° 85 Nov 6.4° 75 Dec
Growing-season temperature
17.3 °C
Warm · 17–19 °C (Jones)
Growing degree days
1,567
Region II: 1,389–1,666 degree days
Growing-season rain
426 mm
Of 800 mm a year
Harvest rain
127 mm
September–October

Copernicus ERA5-Land monthly averages at 5 vineyard points (Vineyard point 1, 176 m; Vineyard point 2, 352 m; Vineyard point 3, 123 m; Vineyard point 4, 329 m; Vineyard point 5, 150 m), moved to each point's height from the model's terrain. Indices that need daily data are not captured yet. How the climate figures are made.

Lower confidence:Monthly reanalysis in moderately complex terrain; not yet checked against a weather station.

Closest climates in the database

Picked by the data, not by hand: the profiles nearest on season warmth (counted twice), degree days, rain, ripening-month nights and day–night range. Neighbours within 30 km are left out, as they share the same weather.

1. MonterreiVery similarCompared with Malepère: same season warmth, similar rain.
2. TolnaVery similarCompared with Malepère: same season warmth, similar rain.
3. ДрагоевоVery similarCompared with Malepère: same season warmth, similar rain.

Growing-season temperature

Malepère
17.3 °C
Monterrei
17.3 °C
Tolna
17.3 °C
Драгоево
17.3 °C

Growing degree days

Malepère
1,567
Monterrei
1,570
Tolna
1,565
Драгоево
1,584

Growing-season rain

Malepère
426 mm
Monterrei
421 mm
Tolna
438 mm
Драгоево
426 mm

03 · Year by year

35 vintages

Each column is one growing season: heat above or below the 1991–2020 average, and rain at harvest. Pick a year for the details.

Warmer than averageCooler than averageHarvest rain (Sep–Oct)Average harvest rain, 127 mm
2025
Growing-season temp.
Growing degree days
Harvest rain
Growing-season rain
September nights
Hot days and frosts

Seasons are labelled by harvest year (April–October). Year-to-year changes from ERA5-Land; tested against station records in Alto Adige (r = 0.94 for season temperature at Bolzano). Rain varies more locally, so treat single-season rain with some caution. Vintage ratings, harvest dates and frost or hail events have places in the data model but are not loaded yet.

04 · Where the numbers come from

Sources

  1. A geospatial inventory of regulatory information for wine protected designations of origin in Europe · Candiago et al., Scientific Data 9, 394 (2022); Eurac Research · CC0
  2. Quality wines in Italy and France: a dataset of PDO specifications · figshare 25393261 · CC BY 4.0
  3. ERA5-Land monthly averaged data (reanalysis-era5-land-monthly-means) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), Climate Data Store · CC BY 4.0 (Copernicus licence)
  4. OpenStreetMap vineyard areas (landuse=vineyard), from Geofabrik country extracts · OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL 1.0
  5. Copernicus DEM GLO-90 (AWS open data tiles) · European Space Agency / Copernicus · Copernicus DEM licence
  6. Cahier des charges: Malepère (Cahier des charges de l’appellation d’origine contrôlée MALEPÈRE homologué par arrêté du 2 septembre 2022 publié au JORF du 9 septembre 2022 (AGRT2221721A) - BO) · Ministère de l'Agriculture (Bulletin officiel), as linked by INAO · Official act
  7. Délimitation parcellaire des AOC viticoles de l'INAO · Institut national de l'origine et de la qualité (INAO), via data.gouv.fr · Licence Ouverte / Open Licence (Etalab)
  8. Climate profiles calculated by Vinous: method
Still to check (3)
  • Generated from EU reference data: check against the current product specification.
  • From the specification: The register lists only 'Malepère'; the text governs rosé separately, so it is added. Minimum grape sugar is 189 g/l for cabernet-sauvignon and cot, 198 g/l for other varieties, so the per-wine field is left null; red wines may hold at most 3 g/l residual sugar (4 g/l above 14% natural alcohol), but the figures sit alone on table lines that the checker strips as page numbers, so the field is left null. Minimum density is 4,000 vines/ha (written "4 000", not matchable by the checker, so left null); irrigated parcels are limited to 6,500 kg/ha. Vineyards and blends need at least two varieties, principal at least 50% of the holding's vineyard; reds are aged until at least 15 February of the year after the harvest with at most 0.4 g/l malic acid; rosés are released under article D. 645-17.
  • National tier (DOC/DOCG) not captured yet; rules extracted from the specification text.