(TDB) - Wine cooperative Plaimont may have found a solution to a demand for less alcoholic reds from hot wine regions – an ancient grape currently known as Pedebernade 5.

The producer, which comprises 1,000 growers across four regions in southwest France, planted the largest private collection of historic grapes in 2002 to preserve the ancient varieties of the Saint Mont appellation, where sandy soils six-metres deep have allowed vines to survive phylloxera, among other root-eating pests.

Called the Conservatoire Ampélographique de Saint Mont, a one-hectare plot contains as many as 39 different varieties, including 12 grapes which are unknown to the world of wine – more than half the twenty unidentified vines in all of France.

One of these, known as Pedebernade no. 5, produces wines with naturally low-levels of alcohol. It is named after Monsieur Pedebernade who owns the ancient vineyard where the variety was first discovered.

Olivier Bourdet-Pees, managing director of Plaimont Producteurs explained during a tasting in London last month, “When a grape like Pedebernade no. 5 disappears you need to find out why, because the ancient growers weren’t silly, and with this grape it’s easy to understand: the level of alcohol is really low.”

Indeed, a wine from the 2008 vintage tasted by db had just 9.8% abv, although Bourdet-Pees said that the alcohol level 100 years ago, when the weather was colder in Saint Mont, and “winegrowing was not so good”, was probably nearer 5-6%.

Continuing, he said that Plaimont’s Pedebernade no. 5, which was planted in 2002, had produced wines from 9% to a maximum of 10.2% abv, making it good for blending with high alcohol varieties in southwest France, or planting in hot places elsewhere in the world.