The founder of an environmentally-minded wine company who "significantly" polluted a stream has blamed an early, wet harvest putting pressure on his fledgling waste initiative.
Peter Yealands, founder of Yealands Family Wines, has admitted allowing the black, sticky winemaking byproduct grape marc to leach into soil near a waterway.
The marc leachate, or liquid drained from the marc of grape skins and seeds, seeped into Sixteen Valley Stream, southeast of Blenheim in 2016.
Tests showed the stream's water quality was severely affected with grey clouds and a black fungus appearing.