What is made here
Wine colours
Colours the rules allow. Pick a colour to filter the rules and grapes below.
Where it is
Sarica Niculiţel in Romania
- Latitude
- 45.0°–45.4° N
- Vineyard altitude
- 18 m to 129 m
- Production zone
- 148,932 ha
Boundary drawn from whole communes, so it is a little larger than the legal zone. Boundary: Eurac Research PDO inventory (CC0). 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 Sarica Niculiţel must meet.
Other varieties allowed
Besides the main grapes, the rules allow these varieties in some wines. Grape names link where a profile exists.
18 varieties ·
Aligoté, Burgund Mare, Băbeasacă Neagră, Cabernet Franc, Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Fetească Albă, Fetească Neagrăn, Fetească Regală, Merlot, Muscat Ottonel, Pinot Grigio, Pinot Noir, Riesling Italian, Riesling de Rhin, Rkatiteli, Sauvignon Blanc, Syrah
In the vineyard and cellar: rules for every wine
3,330
Vines per hectare, minimum
Permitted, with limits
Irrigation
02 · Climate fingerprint
The climate
The growing season averages 18.3 °C, warm on Gregory Jones's scale, with 1,776 growing degree days (Winkler III).
The average year 1991–2020, vineyards at about 70 m
Monthly mean, °CRain, mmGrowing season
- Growing-season temperature
- 18.3 °C
- Warm · 17–19 °C (Jones)
- Growing degree days
- 1,776
- Region III: 1,667–1,943 degree days
- Growing-season rain
- 357 mm
- Of 558 mm a year
- Harvest rain
- 90 mm
- September–October
Copernicus ERA5-Land monthly averages at 5 vineyard points (Vineyard point 1, 53 m; Vineyard point 2, 69 m; Vineyard point 3, 131 m; Vineyard point 4, 24 m; Vineyard point 5, 73 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.
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. AdamclisiVery similarCompared with Sarica Niculiţel: same season warmth, similar rain.
2. BabadagVery similarCompared with Sarica Niculiţel: same season warmth, similar rain.
3. OltinaVery similarCompared with Sarica Niculiţel: same season warmth, similar rain.
Growing-season temperature
Growing degree days
Growing-season rain
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, 90 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
- 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
- ERA5-Land monthly averaged data (reanalysis-era5-land-monthly-means) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), Climate Data Store · CC BY 4.0 (Copernicus licence)
- OpenStreetMap vineyard areas (landuse=vineyard), from Geofabrik country extracts · OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL 1.0
- Copernicus DEM GLO-90 (AWS open data tiles) · European Space Agency / Copernicus · Copernicus DEM licence
- Product specification: Sarica Niculiţel (Caiet sarcini DOC SARICA NICULITEL for Notify.pdf) · National authority, as filed in the EU register (eAmbrosia) · Official document
- Climate profiles calculated by Vinous: method
Still to check (3)
- Generated from EU reference data: check against the current product specification.
- From the specification: Traditional mentions D.O.C.-C.M.D. (full maturity) and D.O.C.-C.T. (late harvest); the lowest yield of each is kept. Kg/ha (CT/CMD): Muscat Ottonel, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Pinot Noir, Fetească Neagră, Syrah 8,000/9,000; Fetească Albă, Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Pinot Gris, Merlot 9,000/11,000; Aligoté, Rieslings, Burgund Mare 11,000 (CMD only); Fetească Regală, Rkaţiteli, Băbească Neagră 12,000 (CMD only). Wine hl/ha (CT/CMD): 52/60, 60/75, 75 and 82 for the same groups. Rosé wines are mentioned only in the sulphur limits and get no separate rules. Malolactic fermentation is part of the method; heat treatment of red must is prohibited. Rezervă and Vin de vinotecă apply to any colour; Vin tânăr is sold before the end of the harvest year. Sub-designation Tulcea and named plai may be added; vineyards need 80 % varietal purity.
- National tier (DOC/DOCG) not captured yet; rules extracted from the specification text.