While it was relatively sunny this week, enabling the mowing season to start and getting early crops planted, I'm sure winter hasn't had its final fling yet!
The broad beans we sowed in November last year are coming up quite well and look mostly healthy. Inevitably with autumn sown seed there are some losses, but out of the 50, we have 42 up and about which is a bit better than last year, if memory serves. The first year we had autumn sown broad beans there, I put out over a hundred seeds and 96 produced something. More recently I have had trouble sourcing seed (which is nuts really). I buy my planting garlic and shallot sets in the market at la Flèche - the garlic is local, so should be right for the climate, while the shallots come in from Brittany, but they know their onions over that way (hahaha!). Most of the garlic and shallots are under minipolytunnel - not because they need protection from the elements but because they need protection from cat bottoms and whatever it is that is digging test holes around the Garden. The trail camera may tell us more one day!
The Asian hornet trapping season starts next week - it may be a bit early, but getting the overwintered queens is important, or they will get the big nests going and kill more bees. At this time of year it is possible to see the old nests in the trees - the secondary nests are generally high up, while primary nests can be in a hedge or a shed or lean-to. We spotted one today and walked back to look at it - so high it is nearly impossible to get a photo that is meaningful, certainly with a phone camera. It does explain where all the hornets came from that ate their way through a huge pile of windfall apples! It also puts us on our guard for the emerging queens, so next weekend our two traps will be set, as the local observatory gets going for the 2022 campaign.
However sunny it has been, the evenings and mornings are cold, so Poirot spends a lot of time fire worshipping in the evenings, and the snowdrops are quite happy and flowering away. Spring is still a good month off!
There is something about the sharp, crisp light of a sunny winter's day that makes it easier to see problems - like we finally spotted the hornets' nest today for example. A couple of weeks ago, I looked up at the west facing facade of the house and decided I wasn't happy. I shared my fears with John and I got the big local masonry firm out to have a look. The big boss turned up and looked at the wrong chimney and said it was not problem to fix. No, on our house - so he looked up and said yes, it needed a bit of pointing, no problem, they can do that. No, no, not that side, look up from the road side - silence, sharp intake of breath, muttered "lalala" and "merde", then - yes, that needs doing, doing very soon, I'll get you an estimate next working day. Which, to be fair, he did, and we got it back within 24 hours. Now we wait for permissions to be granted and then we will be covered with scaffolding for a chimney rebuild. Yoiks!
There has been so little activity on the trail camera, we have wondered if it was still working. Last weekend, once it came back from a likely but unfruitful site, I put it up overnight in the chicken run, to make sure it was working. So now you can enjoy the spectacle of chicken breakfast time, from a chicken's eye view! So much technology for this -
Until next week!
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