Hard: Wine taster's term for a wine with excessive tannin. Usually indicates a certain severity due to excessive acidity and tannin.

Heavy: Excessive alcohol content without a corresponding balance of flavour.

Hollow: Lacks depth of flavour.

Hot: Dusty, hot country wine flavour. Can also describe the mouthfeel of excessive alcohol content in wine.

Hybrid: A grape variety made by a combination of two different wine varieties usually vitis vinifera and one of the American native vines. This is achieved by cross pollination.

Hydrogen Sulphide: When hydrogen combines with sulphur dioxide. If allowed to progress, hydrogen sulphide can develop into mercaptans and ruin the wine.

Ice Wine: Produced from grapes that are left on the vine well past normal harvest times. The grapes are then pressed while frozen to achieve concentration of both sugars and acid. The end result is a wine that is sweet, acidic and highly concentrated in flavour.

Inoculation: The introduction of a special yeast culture, or any other organism into the pressed grape juice.

Ink: Refers to deep purple colour found in young wines.

Integrated: Describes the wood and fruit balance in wines.

Jammy: Fat and eminently drinkable red wine, rich in fruit. Can sometimes refer to a wine of heavy character that results from over pressing bigripe fruit. As such wines age, the fruit oxidizes to produce a character reminiscent of port.

Lees: The sediment made up of mainly spent yeast cells that are deposited in the storage vessel. The lees are left behind by racking.

Length: The amount of time that the aftertaste stays in the mouth. The better the wine, the longer the length. Also applies to very bad wines.

Light: A complimentary term applied to pleasant refreshing wines. Pale colour, light weight.

Lingering: Flavour, aroma that stays.

Lively: A wine with lots of fizz.

Loam: A soil containing a mixture of clay, silt and sand that is best for the growth of most plants. Loam is not necessarily ideal for viticulture, as it can encourage excessive growth.