We’re barely into a new year and already people are anxious to catch no more than a glimpse of the troubled 2011 slipping quickly out of view. But for the growers and winery owners along Sonoma County’s northern coast, good news came late in the year.
In December 2011, the Fort Ross-Seaview AVA was approved by the federal Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB), a windfall that Linda Schwartz, co-owner of Fort Ross 
Vineyard said was the culmination of years of hard work. “We began working on the petition in 1999 and 14 years later we got a fine Christmas present.”
Schwartz, her husband, Lester, and David Hirsch, a local grower and winemaker, spearheaded the effort with Hirsch the principal petitioner. “The Fort Ross-Seaview AVA is distinguished by its cool, maritime climate, the altitude of its steep mountain vineyards above the fog line and its proximity to the Pacific Ocean,” says Schwartz. Fort Ross Vineyard has sweeping views of the ocean to the west and the coastal range of low eastern mountains rising up behind the vineyard. The varied growing conditions within the boundaries of the new AVA are ideal for a wide range of wine grapes, says Schwartz, although the area is mainly known for Chardonnay and Pinot Noir, varieties that have helped build a strong reputation for the larger Sonoma Coast appellation.
In recent years Pinot Noir and Chardonnay from coastal vineyards in Sonoma County have stirred a lot of interest among cognoscenti of Burgundy-style wines. Schwartz explains that the much larger Sonoma Coast AVA doesn’t offer the same closely defined growing conditions as the new Fort Ross-Seaview AVA and the Russian River Valley AVA, which is further from the influence of the ocean. “The Russian River AVA produces wines that show more fruit and less structure as the weather in that appellation is considerably warmer and the grapes mature earlier than in the Fort Ross-Seaview AVA.” She notes that the only difference between vineyards in Fort Ross and those in Seaview is the distance from the Pacific Ocean.
Currently there are three wineries in the Fort Ross-Seaview AVA: Hirsch, Flowers and Wild Hog. Schwartz says that for logistical reasons a number of prominent vintners (Failla, Fort Ross, Martinelli, Marcassin, Peter Michael) have their wineries elsewhere in Sonoma County. Fort Ross Vineyard is constructing a tasting room at their estate vineyard, the only tasting room in the new AVA, scheduled to open this spring.
In other new AVA news, the Russian River Valley AVA received authorization to expand the appellation last November. The new expansion will extend to just west of the cities of Rohnert Park and Coati, south of the city of Santa Rosa.
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