It rained last Sunday as I wrote last week's blog, it rained again on the Monday too. On Tuesday, when I went over to Chinon for a visit, the fields by the autoroute were under water in many places, la Loire was full, but not dramatically so, but the Vienne was well over its banks and had closed quite a few roads. When I was there, it was perhaps 4.3 metres over its usual level and hadn't reached its peak. Fortunately for those in the area, it didn't reach the high end of the estimated flood levels and started to recede later on the Wednesday.
We were therefore interested to see what awaited us at la Flèche on Wednesday morning, when we were there for the market. Parking was surprisingly easy, but I'm guessing that was an access issue. Le Loir was seriously over its banks, with many riverside gardens flooded, the overspill carpark by the bus station underwater, and a number of roads flooded. It was even more astounding that parking was easy, when one of the carparks right by the market was also underwater - I've never seen it that high there. Perhaps half term made things easier.
With the rivers so high, it is only logical that our various ponds are also filling up. The two main ponds at the bottom of The Orchard are doing wonderfully well - the level in the upper one is just at the limit of the overflow pipe (so it may well have been higher) while the lower one is at what I would call a sensible level. With the winds on Thursday, we lost a chunk of one of the surrounding trees, which is now in the pond, and will need to be dealt with in due course.
Finally, yesterday we made it to the One Acre Wood and as expected, found the two small, ephemeral ponds there were full of water too. They form in the pits dug to find clay for making tiles, and there are vague ditches that lead into them, but not the main ditches that mark the boundaries of our piece of land. When these ponds form, they are a magnet for newts and salamanders. Yesterday the upper pond was totally still, today both pond surfaces shivered with the antics of either marsh gas or hidden amphibians doing their thing. You can also see a wild animal trail going to the right of the pond, and there is now a discrete trail camera keeping an eye to see who visits. I'm not totally hopeful - the last time we had a trail camera there, it caught a chaffinch and that was it.
The pack of three new cameras has arrived, and one is now installed by the ponds at the bottom of The Orchard, a place that has always put on a good show. Another is at the One Acre Wood, while the third did a sterling job showing us who was eating all the cat food we put out for the Barn Cats. It was pleasing to see that in the main, it was the three boys eating it, but there are two others who are popping in of an evening for a good feed. One we know as Minnie the Moocher, the other is a big fluffy thing we do not know. Anyway, mystery solved and the spare camera is here, waiting for my next inspiration.
Today is sunny and not raining. It is really too wet to do anything too useful in most places, although the portion of the wildflower Meadow that John has decided will be an asparagus bed was actually fine to rotavate today. I'm not planting shallots or onions until we have had a couple of mainly dry weeks (which looks possible after Wednesday), but I could lift the last carrots and parsnips, along with a couple of leeks, so I can spend tomorrow making soup for the freezer. There are also signs of rhubarb from one of the crowns we have, so that also inspires us.
Today we allowed Rebus the Psychokitten out into the garden for a bit of a run - he is so full of energy and just needs to run, perhaps he is in fact half whippet? The chickens aren't totally happy with us, while Bridie the Freeloading Bantam has taken to a high perch in disgust. Such is life!
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