With a viticultural history that stretches back to 1858, Mudgee has played a key role in the Australian wine story. The beautifully soft and intimate nature of much of the countryside around Mudgee is fashioned by the outer rim of hills which create the "nest ".
The smaller hills within the perimeter give rise to a panorama of mini vistas with ever more valleys nesting in their midst. This is the stunning location where the winemakers, vignerons and grape growers ply their craft.
Mudgee Regional Snapshot 2023-24
Regional Snapshots are one-page profiles updated annually of individual Australian wine regions. They provide at-a-glance summary statistics on: climatic characteristics, viticulture data, winegrape production, and winegrape price and export sales data for wine, compared against the same statistics for the whole of Australia.
Download nowCabernet Sauvignon
Possibly Mudgees Hero variety, usually as a 100% varietal but sometimes blended with Merlot or Shiraz. The wines have tremendous depth of colour and hold their purple-red hues for longer than those of the Hunter, turning brick red at seven to 10 years of age. The generous flavours reflect the warm climate; a melange of tastes of red berry, dark chocolate and, sometimes, eucalypt and peppermint. The tannins are almost invariably pronounced but are not excessively astringent, for they are balanced by the generosity of the fruit.
Chardonnay
This is the predominant white from the region and is consistently good. The flavours are usually in the peach, melon, fig spectrum but often citrus and grapefruit characteristics emerge, particularly where the maker employs barrel-ferment techniques. The wines show their best varietal character in the second and third years but do go on to develop into rich and honeyed regional styles over a much longer timeframe.
Riesling
Riesling has made a resurgence in Mudgee in recent years, with a few producers focusing on quality, single vineyard wines. Vineyard site selection is paramount, with elevation and soil playing an important role. Off dry styles through to bone dry have great fruit intensity and purity, with citrus and orange blossom characters.
Semillon
While this Semillon may live in the shadow of the Hunter, the styles can be similar, as is the capacity to age gloriously in bottle for up to 20 years. Mudgee Semillon can be picked at low sugar levels and display grassy, nutty characters with great length of flavour.
- Situated on the western slopes of the Great Dividing Range, Mudgee has some of the highest vineyards in Australia, ranging from 450 – 1180m above sea level.
- Frosts and cold nights delay budburst; rainfall and humidity are low; sunshine hours are great; and irrigation is essential on some but the most favoured sites.
- The summer and autumn days are warm, and harvest is four weeks behind the Hunter because of Mudgees cooler climate and much higher altitude.
- The brownish coloured soils are typical of those found through the majority of the wine regions of eastern Australia; slightly acidic or sandy loam over neutral clay subsoils, but both topsoil and subsoil have the advantage of being quite well drained.
- Some of the most favoured sites have shale, quartz and seabed sandstone.