Winemaking - Soils - Environment - Ageing on lees - GIS

NANTES SOILS
MUSCADET COTEAUX DE LA LOIRE "Between the mild climate of the Anjou region and the ocean breezes" the Muscadet soils cultivated on the hillsides overlooking the Loire are dominantly mica schist with foliated habit. These very visible stones on the hillsides give off strong odours of gun flint. Complementary soils composed of gneiss and antacid rocks are also found west of Ancenis between Liré and Loroux Bottereau.
	MUSCADET SEVRE ET MAINE The very old land is intermingled with eruptive rocks. South of the appellation, the soil rests on granite bedrock. In the north, the soil is essentially composed of mica schist. In the centre (Vallet, Le Pallet, Mouzillon…), antacid rocks give the ground a dark brown colour (gabbros).
MUSCADET COTES DE GRANDLIEU Located around the Grandlieu Lake, the soils are also very complex. In the northern part of the appellation, very close to the capital of Nantes, the land is on the same geological fold as the Muscadet of the Loire hillsides with mica schists and gneiss. You will note also the considerable presence of sand with shingles in this region. South of the lake, besides antacid rocks, you also find sandy clay soils from the Pliocene period.
	MUSCADET/GROS PLANT Impossible to characterise this appellation. The geographical area is just too large. It extends over three village appellations and over some small areas bordering them. The parent rocks of the soils can be either very acid like coarse-grained granite or ultra antacid like gabbro, or even intermediaries between the two forms…what complexity!
COTEAUX D'ANCENIS This very original soil region of the Primary era is made up of schist and Palaeozoic sandstone. This structural unit called Synclinal of Ancenis is bordered by faults (Loire…) and extends for a length of forty kilometres with a width of around 10 kilometres.

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Winemaking - Soils - Environment - Ageing on lees - GIS