Château La Fon du Berger

The château

La Fon du Berger is a family’s own making. After a career in the police, Paul Bougès settled at Saint-Sauveur, 3 kilometers west of Pauillac, the village of his wife Jeanine, and worked a few plots of vines whose grapes went to the Canterayne cooperative. Their son Gérard took over the small farm in 1983 and planted new plots, and in 1988, with his wife Marie-Christine, he made the first vintage at the property under the name Château La Fon du Berger. The name comes from a place in Pauillac where the family had early vines: fon is Occitan for a fountain, and shepherds grazed their flocks there. The vat room was built in 1999 beside the barrel cellar, the first Pauillac was made at the estate the same year, and in 2003 the Haut-Médoc became a Cru Bourgeois.

The 3rd generation now runs it. Vincent Bougès, the eldest son, an agricultural engineer who worked for several years at Château Lynch-Bages, runs the vineyard and follows the winemaking; in 2015 he bought vines of the former Saint-Sauveur cooperative and created his own estate, Château Les Gravilles. Guillaume Bougès, the youngest, looks after sales, and in the summer of 2022 he opened a first gîte for visitors.

The Haut-Médoc vines grow on sandy clay, on clay and limestone and on gravel over clay: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Petit Verdot and Cabernet Franc, 35 years old on average. The Pauillac comes from deep gravel on hilltops, 70% Cabernet Sauvignon and 30% Merlot, from vines 45 years old on average. The estate has moved to Haute Valeur Environnementale (High Environmental Value, the French state’s environmental certification for farms) at level 3, and a herd of Galloway cattle keeps the meadows beside the vineyard and supplies part of the organic manure for the vines. Besides the Haut-Médoc, a Cru Bourgeois in the classifications of 2020 and 2025, and the Pauillac, it makes Château Les Gravilles, a Haut-Médoc; Cante l’Âne, a Haut-Médoc made only from Cabernet Franc planted in the 1960s; and a rosé, Chasse Soif.

At a glance

Appellation

Haut-Médoc; the estate also makes a Pauillac

Commune

Saint-Sauveur

Classification

Cru Bourgeois, 2003, 2020 and 2025

Owners

The Bougès family

Direction

Vincent Bougès, vineyard and winemaking; Guillaume Bougès, sales

Vineyard

Haut-Médoc vines 35 years old on average; Pauillac vines 45

Soil

Haut-Médoc: sandy clay, clay and limestone, gravel over clay; Pauillac: deep gravel on hilltops Terroir of Haut-Médoc →

Grapes

Haut-Médoc: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Petit Verdot, Cabernet Franc; Pauillac: Cabernet Sauvignon 70%, Merlot 30%

Farming

Haute Valeur Environnementale, level 3; a herd of Galloway cattle

Wines

Château La Fon du Berger, Haut-Médoc and Pauillac; Château Les Gravilles, Haut-Médoc; Cante l’Âne, Haut-Médoc; Chasse Soif, rosé