Rural Life

Day 1 - the serious stuff

I know you are never supposed to apologise over this sort of thing, but I had hoped to get the Comice story out there earlier than this.  I blame a combination of being VERY tired indeed, extreme heat, the challenges of getting a new van, and a sort of general maiaise (not Covid - but we did check yesterday, we were so off) for not getting down to it sooner.

Friday night wasn't the best night's sleep as we worried about the podium and the rain.  We were on the field promptly, but the forecast was still dodgy so we didn't unwrap things until about 10am when we could see no more clouds heading our way.  There were also magnificent arrangements of dried grasses and grains, some with a bit of red paint to them, to give a classier air to the stage, in time for the hour and a half of speeches to open the event.  I caught up with those on a live stream on Facebook - I really could not be bothered to wait around to see them in person!

The serious stuff on the Saturday morning, other than the speeches, is the Young Farmers' Ploughing Competition - held on slightly adjacent fields, and with its own bar, so the ones on the field were quite quiet.  I don't know much about ploughing matches, so I didn't go and watch.

For those of us on decorations duty, the other thing to do was to ensure that the tables were decorated and ready to welcome diners - there were 580 metres of tables, each with benches on either side, giving a theoretical 1,400 covers.  We certainly needed them on the Sunday!

There was a certain nostalgic feel to the event - while guingettes are becoming popular again, they were more of a 20th century phenomenon.  It was therefore only right that there were a lot of old tractors knocking around and also a few other old implements - this is the chain oil application end of a two person chainsaw that was demonstrated a few times over the weekend.  It did the job, but it was loud, fixed and needed two people to make it work.

Day 1 is also about livestock, with a cow competition and a Percheron competition (a local breed of heavy horse).  The cows and goats were mostly only in for one day, although a few came back for the second day, just as an interesting feature.

While we weren't there too long on the Saturday afternoon, I did insist on going to see the Percherons.  The mares are so beautiful, and the foals often behave so badly!  A bit like a Lippizaner, Percherons are generally born dark and as they grow older, take on a grey white colour.  They are good work horses - sometimes they are used by loggers to move tree trunks around as they do less damage to the soil than machines - and also make reasonable saddle horses for the portly with long legs and supple hips!

After that, we went off to feed cats, water plants, eat food and rest up as Sunday would be a long day.

The Sunday story should be available during the week - keep an eye out for it!

 

Final push to get it all ready

My last post was brief and quite enigmatic as much of what we were working on was embargoed until the weekend of the Comice itself.

John and I were working on the big arches for the two entrances to the site - the big one was an issue just because of its size, as it was over 2 metres tall and very long.  To get sensible sized letters, we had to make a number of stencils for letters that would be nearly 60 centimetres tall.  The logo could be projected onto the panel and traced, but any other decoration had to be done by hand.  And for the reverse side - the "see you next year, elsewhere" - apart from the fact the letters also had to be pretty huge, there was no guidance, no colour scheme, no theme, so we made it up as we went along.

The smaller arch was more of a problem - no space for projections, too long in relation to its height, and more space to fill in.  Our preferred method of doing the letters with packing labels did not work as, and I'm not sure you will believe this, packing and shipping labels aren't brilliant at sticking in slight humidity.  The weekend before the Comice it was a real rush to get that one finished, so that I was free for the next set of tasks.

There was a nice video of John working on the arch, but Typepad won't let me upload it, and YouTube has done something silly with it, it seems to me!

Then on Monday and Wednesday (Tuesday was a bank holiday) we started to put up more decorations in the village - up to that point, it had just been bunting and the straw bales, now we had silhouettes of dancers popping up all over the place and a stream of jolly music along the wooden barriers by the village hall.

Then on Thursday and Friday we were on the Comice site, putting up even more bunting, dressing the podiums, decorating the vast numbers of marquees, adding fairy lights, signs and all sorts of other bits, so that the exhibitors had a clear run on the Friday afternoon to get installed.  Lunches were served at the village hall for the workers - cold beer has never tasted so good!  It was lovely being all together, working to a common goal and getting to know new people.

Then on Friday evening, we were all summoned to the site for the distribution of volunteer t-shirts for anyone working on site over the weekend, a few words of encouragement from our President, and the unveiling of the big arch.  There is a video stream of that, but California doesn't seem to want to play ball with technology at the moment - I guess they have other problems - so here is the great arch unveiled, and there was applause, which you will have to imagine.

So after a drink to seal team solidarity, it was home to a sensible meal and early to bed to be refreshed for the event - except that rain was forecast, so we spent the night worrying about how various aspects of decoration would stand up to moisture!

To find out how that panned out, look again in a couple of days' time as I'm not wrestling recalcitrant IT any more today!

 

It's nearly time, and still so much to do!

Yes, nearly that time - indeed by this time next week, the procession of decorated floats will have happened and we should be watching a fine women's orchestra cabaret.  If you aren't aware or aren't in the area - the bales are out and about and decorated.  There was a team of 5 of us on Monday doing the first 5, then a team of 6 on Tuesday finished off the last 4.  Here are the first and last.

The first time I got involved in a Comice was at Chartrené in 2008, where with a friend's children and John as a windmill, we did a spirited rendition of A Windmill in Old Amsterdam for no good readon - read about it here!  In 2009 we were a bit more daring and a large group of us danced the Time Warp for a very confused audience!

The last time the Comice was at Vieil Baugé was 2010, when we had a stall so were only really involved in helping out on the Sunday evening meal - we will be on the same field as last time.

The year after us, it was Vaulandry's turn with stinking hot weather.  On the Saturday we did a rendition in French of Old MacDonald had a Farm, while on Sunday there was the parade of decorated floats and ploughng matches.  2012 was Fougeré - we weren't particularly involved in that one, but did go to see the floats.  I think 2013 might have been Baugé when I dressed up as a mad chef as part of a tableau of Ratatouille, and I have no recollection of 2014 at all on the blogs.

2015 and I got my act together a bit for Cheviré le Rouge and our visions of lands local and far away.  2016 was an epic event where we celebrated the Battle of Vieil Baugé at Bocé complete with Scottish mercenaries, victorious French and wounded English - no blog though!  In fact the next one I did a blog about was in 2021 when Echimiré bravely did the first post-Covid session, and very good it was too!  Last year it was Pontigné's turn just after the major forest fire - a really good communal event.

Next week's blog will naturally be delayed by a day, or possibly two, and now I must go off and do secret squirrel decorating tasks, because one or two things are getting a bit urgent.  I hope you enjoy looking back at previous events.

So much to do, so little time!

It's the final straight before the Comice.  Most days this week have been taken up doing "stuff", but unless that stuff is already out in the streets and fields, it is embargoed.  The weather has meant less progress has been made on some aspects than we would have liked - the wind and rain made working on straw bales nearly impossible.  It was possible to progress items that will be installed on the fields in due course, as we are working on them in a disused piggery, so we have shelter, power, space and quiet (unless we have a bluetooth speaker with us to blast out radio).  And when I say we, it isn't just John and I, it is all sorts of other people, including my next door neighbour's granddaughter, getting involved.

Next week I will find links to blogs I have written on previous Comices (Comici?) to show what the fuss is all about.

When not working on decorations, I have been keeping an eye on the new trail camera.  The boar are still around and a deer or two have passed by - they look rather odd from a higher angle!

On Thursday, I caught a different strange animal on the camera - one that I would not expect to see on our land before September.  I wasn't delighted, but I think I remember seeing a couple around this time last year too.

We think that the cristophine might be contemplating flowers - today there was a slightly different growth on a couple of the main stems.  It has grown another three feet or so in a number of directions so there is certainly enough oomph in it to think about flowering and fruiting I would suggest.

The sweetcorn got a real battering in the winds during the week - two named storms at this time of year and this side of the Atlantic is a bit odd.  While we were not near the strongest gusts, the gaps in hedges and trees funnel the wind in weird ways.  The big fields of maize are closely planted and dense, while our wee area of sweetcorn is only three rows deep, but it has all survived and the silks are out and starting to turn brown, which is good!

Digging up the week's potatoes, I met one of my garden helpers.  From the size and shape of her, I think she has been doing very well on slugs, and certainly none of the potatoes have slug damage, so I think she is rather effective, if not the prettiest person on the plot.

Anyway, I must now go and deal with a rather pleasing problem.  Back in the days before Brexit was even considered, my mother in law bought us a Victoria Plum tree, to take the place of the medlar tree that didn't seem to like our garden (shame as the flowers were gorgeous).  It wasn't cheap and we had to source it in the UK, as they aren't a thing in France.  Since then we have nurtured it and protected it and been rewarded with at best a dozen fruit in a season, and only if we can get to them before the chickens.  This year is different.  This year it is loaded and we have supports under many branches to help it cope.  This afternoon I have promised myself I will make a batch of plum crumbles for the freezer, as well as one for tonight, so I'd better go and pick and stone some fruit and get baking.

Have a good week!

 

Harvests and cameras

After weeks of nurturing, watering, weeding and worrying, the first serious harvests are starting in the potager.  We've been digging up a couple of potatoes from the first block of 18, for a few weeks now - well this is the seventh weekend to be precise.  The potatoes are second earlies and were planted in three blocks over a period of about 4 weeks, and the first block are very ready to be harvested.  By taking just a couple of plants a week, we have enough and more for us to eat over the week and don't have to worry about storage and drying off.  The next two blocks will need that level of attention, but that is a way down the line, post-Comice.

Today's basket of goodies includes potatoes, carrots, a few onions that I missed yesterday when lifting the main block of red onions, a couple of courgettes that I didn't cut yesterday and a couple of little gem lettuce that looked like they were thinking about bolting.

We've also had aubergines - I think 5 so far, or it may be 7, and half a dozen courgettes already and of course there are the red onions to look forward to.

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This is only the start too - there are as many set borlotti beans as we had all season last year, and the bean vines are covered with more flowers.  The butternuts haven't yet got into their stride, but there are quite a few female flowers developing.  The tomatoes have some good looking trusses on them - fingers crossed that they ripen and don't get struck by blight.  And there is the cristophine vine, which gets bigger as you watch it and now has a vast structure set up for it to rampage over.  Perhaps one day there will be flowers and fruits too - in the meantime it provides shelter for a couple of tomatoes that I rejected for the main plot as they were runt plants, so have gone totally mad as companion plants for the cristophine.

Another bit of companion planting that we did as an experiment also seems to be working.  Parsnips are very slow to get going, so "they" recommend inter-sowing with something that is quicker off the mark and doesn't stay in the ground as long.  I put the row of parsnips at the edge of the potato bed, so one bit of companion planting I guess.  I sowed parsnips every 4 to 6 inches and in between sowed carrots.  As you have seen, the carrots are doing fine.  Many of the parsnips are also doing very well too and their leaves can be seen over the potatoes and swamping the carrots in places!  They've got months more growing time to go too.

So to the saga of the trail camera.  It developed a fault.  Basically the switch inside the protective shell got disconnected, and despite having had it less than two years, it was out of warranty (I know EU warranties are 2 years - I did point that out to the supplier, but I know when I am on a hiding to nothing).  It had been attacked a few times by boar, a pine martin, a few garden birds and a few hornets, so it had a hard life!  Anyway, I couldn't cope without one, so blagged a discount code off the supplier, who were very good and allowed me to apply that discount to something that was already discounted, and also made sure it was sent through express, so the new one arrived on Wednesday and was installed on Thursday - once I had read the instructions with the help of a magnifying glass!!  We rigged it up in a tree close to where the last one died to see what was happening and test it out.  Boar are what is happening - they must be on their second litter of the year, and they do just love the shallow ponds for wallowing in.  The fish aren't so keen, but as there is little water, despite the rain, the fish are dying off, so I guess the boar can have their fun.

We'll see what more porcine fun appears over the next week.

In the meantime, the Comice approaches at a terrifying speed and I need to concentrate on painting dancers and doing lettering (some of it very big) so that people have an idea what is going on.  I've done the logos on the two arches (photo is of the smaller one), now for the lettering....

Have a good week!

 

Being a good peasant

Apologies for not posting yesterday - I was indeed being a good peasant, and had just got my hands on 4 kilos of very ripe yellow plums - if I didn't jam them yesterday, they would have gone in the new burping barrel, and that would have been a waste.  I had also turned down a tray of apricots in favour of free plums for jam making, so had to get cracking.  But taking the stones out and chopping up 4 kilos of plums takes time, then you have to gently cook them, before adding the sugar and pushing to setting temperature.  Still, we started the half jar today at breakfast, and it was jolly yum, so definitely worth it and you will have to believe me!

And once that was done, I thought I was on a roll, so I spent an hour peeling the tiny shallots for pickling (no photo), at which point it was time to do all the bits for crab and comté soufflé for dinner.

At the start of the week, I was able to enjoy this wonderful vista over a vast field of sunflowers - in general they are nearly over but I was able to catch this field near its best.

Close to, some of the flower heads were huge, and while still flowering at the centre. birds had already started to peck away at the ripening seeds.  I picked out a few myself for sowing next year (just 8) and they were slightly sticky to the touch but fat and well filled.

Midweek I was able to spend a bit of time working in the potager and was able, after doing a bit of watering, to thin out the carrots a bit, particularly those that were quite close to the nicely developing parsnips.  I sowed a sort of heritage variety of multicoloured carrots - apparently all shades between white and black, via yellow, orange and red.  So far those I have thinned have been firmly in the white to orange spectrum, which is a shame as black carrots are so dramatic!

The woodstore by the potager is very useful for drying off crops once lifted, such as shallots, onions and potatoes, before they go to storage or are used.  It has the standard tin roof, ventilated wooden walls and a sandy floor.  This seems to be an ideal home for antlion larvae.  I've not dug down to see what they look like, but we have a lot of depressions which are very characteristic and very intriguing.  If I were 50 years younger, I would probably dig one up, now I am more live and let live.

The week has also been about Comice preparations.  I spent Thursday afternoon in a disused piggery with a laptop, projector and a load of paints, trying to trace the logo onto part of a giant panel.  It all went well until the scaffolding holding the projector shifted just a smidge!!

Saturday was Bunting Day - I helped on the morning shift, stringing up bunting down the main drag of the village to get people in the mood for fun.  It's amazing how lots of small triangles of fabric on a piece of bailing twine can make everything seem so much more festive!  In the afternoon our house got bunting on its façade too, which I can see a small bit of when in the back garden - it's the small things that can give so much pleasure!

Next week I'll try to be more timely, but there is a lot more Comice preparation to do!

 

A few weird and wonderful things

I'm tired and lacking inspiration - the last couple of weeks have been focussed on writing a final evaluation report for a funded project I have been following since 2017 (!).  How do you condense the highs and lows of such a diverse and successful project in a reasonable amount of space?  Rhetorical - no need to come back to me on that.  So yesterday when I pressed the send button at 7pm, I wasn't in the mood to write a blog.  To be honest, I'm not sure I am today either, but looking through the photos of the past week, I did spot some weird and wonderful things, and I share them here.

The black day lily is coming towards the end of its flowering season, but was looking particularly fine one evening this week, with flowers that were almost velvety.  It has been abused for at least two years, living in an old metal beer keg, but seems happy enough.

I've been abusing semper vivums for even longer - they do remarkably well in the funny plastic pots you can get that strap on to downpipes.  There is little soil in there, and when they do what they do, very little way to get any water into that soil as they make a seemingly impervious cover to the pot and beyond.  Then, just occasionally, they go absolutely mad and flower, looking like some sort of extra-terrestrial.  This year's display is particularly fine.

We share our lives with cats, six of them currently.  Nibbles has been with us for 14 or so years, having decamped from living in difficult conditions with a tortured artist who had the hovel next door.  She has certain bizarre traits, one of which is enjoying drinking her water (and the grottiest, dirtiest water she can find in general) from her paw.  A video is better, obviously, but you get the idea.

Once I have finished doing time on the computer at the end of the day, and before cooking dinner, we sit out under the abri, perhaps having a small drinkie-poo, and relax.  We encourage Nibbles to join us - she has hyperthyroidism and is on a drug regime that should sort her out, but the condition has made her a bit lazy.  She also lost a bit of weight so it is pleasing, I guess, that she can put enough pressure through one paw to make an imprint on my leg!

It is hard to get decent photos of moths and butterflies, but I was delighted to get this snap of a tiger moth on our cristophine vine.  It sat there very patiently as I balanced the cat I was carrying at the time, got my phone out of my back pocket, unlocked it, got the camera app going and then took the picture.  Of course, with it sitting still, you only get the tiger stripes and not the vivid orange underwing colour, but even so, it pleases me.

Each evening, when I have done the watering, I got up to the car park over the road, stand on the edge of the field and look out.  If I think I'm not being watched, I might also do a yoga salutation to the sun, but I have to be convinced!  I do always look up to admire the sky - it's a big sky at that point, open to the south and west for kilometres without power lines or buildings, and makes the spirit soar, particularly after a glass of chardonnay.  There was a day where the weather was changing last week, with cloud coming in from the west, with wispy swirls and higher masses all looking like harbingers of something new.

In a normal week, my lack of inspiration would have been solved by something from the trail camera.  Sadly it appears that being attacked by boar and various small birds doesn't make for a long life, and I am having to look for a new one.  But I still have loads of stuff to check through, so perhaps there will be videos next week, or I might just decide to stay away from computers and live life a bit.  Have a good week!

 

Budget bulbs and the Tour de France

I don't follow much sport nowadays - I used to spend much of the summer in front of the TV watching test cricket, but the sell out to Sky and the move to France scuppered that.  The French aren't quite so intent on giving over mainstream TV to sport on a weekly basis but there are a few events that they go nuts for.  Obviously key football tournaments come into that category, as does Six Nations Rugby and I imagine that as host of the Rugby World Cup later this year, that will be wall to wall too. 

There are two events that I follow with a passion though - the Dakar Rally during the first couple of weeks of January, and the Tour de France during the first three weeks of July in general.  We are on day 9 now, and a day where the stage finish is at altitude, finishing with 4.3km of 11% climb going up the Puy du Dome sometime near 6pm French time.  I need to watch!  The area is interesting as it has been blocked off from visitors and spectators as a nature reserve, so my usual chuntering about why stupid people jump out in front of the riders will not apply today.

This is the end of the stage.

We are currently enjoying lots of flowers, including dramatic summer bulbs bought from the Pound Shop in England when such things were allowed, and also from Aldi.  They provide a bit of drama at a period when many of my favourite flowers are coming to an end.

Today at the potager, I lifted the shallot crop - rather disappointing given the size and quality of the start bulbs, but they will make a good couple of pots of pickled shallots which are rather nice with cheese and cold meat.  I transplanted into the space they left, some little gem lettuces that we had set off in a seed bed and were far too close together to do any good.  I'm hopeful as the soil is quite moist, but nothing ventured, nothing gained as they say!

Anyway, I've got a report to write, so just a short update this week. 

 

All quiet here in our bit of rural France

Well, I say all quiet, but the countryside is rarely quiet.  There are frogs that make the most awful noises, sometimes just for the fun of it.  There are birds, so many birds, so many different songs, from the eerie cry of a buzzard having fun on the thermals, to the quiet but intense song of a robin - it sounds so melodic and sweet, but I think in the main they are saying "b*gger off, we want to explore where you are for a feed".  Annoyingly, after the quiet of lockdowns, there are planes, all sizes and at all different heights, from the air force boys who went over at about 200 feet last weekend, through the light aircraft from the local aerodrome, to the jets up high taking people to and from Scandinavia and Portugal. 

But this week it has been the Moisson - the grain harvest, with the combines out in the fields of wheat and barley, followed by tractors and massive trailers to take the grains, then more tractors with bailers to turn the straw into vast wheels, and finally lifts and more tractors with the big trailers to take those round bales away into storage.  It doesn't stop for weekends or lack of light - once conditions are right, the competition and demand for the machines is such that they are on the move 24/7, and bad luck if you are near where they are working overnight!!

Last weekend was fiercely hot and humid too - with temperatures up over 30ºC by lunchtime and not below again until after 6pm.  Two days of it was enough to undo the good that the rain the week before had done to the ponds, and sadly at least one of my fish has expired (no photo required).  It also blasted the ripe broad beans from the second sowing, and as it was too hot to pick them, they too got fried.  We rescued some beans and have sown them in some land that needs a bit of green manure, but whether that will work remains to be seen.  It was a disappointment.  The photo shows the fried out pods along with three carrots from the perpetual rounds of thinning them out, with one almost worth eating!

On a more positive note, and surprisingly with the cooler weather, I spotted a couple of my favourite butterflies yesterday - two swallowtails were enjoying a quick snack on the buddleia.  They are often found on lavender round here, but I've not seen them enjoying the buddleia before.  Of course it was pretty impossible to get close to them so these two photos are the best I could manage.

There was also some fruit!  Yesterday while doing the rounds, I spotted that the mirabelles were ripe, so went back for a bowl and picked all that I could, leaving those with a bit of damage or rot for the local critters, but for once getting some for us.  Enough for a 4 portion mirabelle crumble - wowzers!

We have not been responsible for any looting or destruction, but we have found evidence that it has been going on.  This year's thrush anvil is surrounded by empty and broken shells and it is hard to spot the stone that is being used.  I do love this as a sight, as I am very fond of the thrushes, and they do a good job.  Apart from a couple of well munched tomato plants, so far we haven't had any major snail damage this year to small plants, and this is why!

I like black flowers - I know they aren't natural in this part of the world, but i really enjoy them, even if they aren't really jet black.  This year I succumbed to temptation and bought an exotic petunia (just the one) called Black Glitter - the glitter effect comes from tiny white flecks on the flowers - you can't see that from a distance, but you can admire how happy it is in its beer barrel.  Another that is happy in its beer barrel is my black day lily - this really is stretching the definition but it is how it was sold to me!

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Not quite the grapes of wrath, but certainly very happy grapes and magnificent bunches on our vine this year.  Any marks are due to them being brushed past by a car as we drive into the courtyard.  The vine is loaded with them, so I am looking forward to making large quantities of grape jelly - no point making your own wine around here when you can buy excellent professionally-made wine en vrac (not bottled) for 2,80€ a litre!  Also these aren't wine grapes, but table grapes, although with pips so not polite eating grapes.  The chickens love them too.

On a serious note, the riots in the urban centres are frightening and disappointing.  Looting a carton of milk from your local convenience store that won't open for a while now as the owner tries to repair the damage, and your family have to find the money to travel to another, more distant shop is insane.  Similarly trashing and burning down the youth centre where you happily spend time in the winter and during the long holidays makes no sense.  It has nothing to do with the death of a young man, driving a Polish registered car in a bus lane without insurance or a valid drivers licence, and sadly paying for such minor delinquency with his life.  A minority of people are destroying holidays, livelihoods, neighbourhoods, reputation and ensuring that festivities people have been looking forward to for ages are cancelled.  I hope it stops soon.

Ideally by next weekend, if not sooner!  Have a good week!

 

Respect for farmers, and other gardening moments

Last autumn, with rising prices, and war in the East (still going on of course), we looked at ways to protect ourselves from some of the worst possibilities and knowing how much the chickens eat, we thought growing our own might be a good idea.  We had a strip of not exactly the best vegetable plot that didn't have anything in it, and sacrificed half a yoghurt pot of "blé" or chicken grain to the experiment.  Germination was OK, not brilliant, but then the autumn was quite dry really and it is quite possible that local critters helped themselves to some of the seed.  As it wasn't sown in rows, and was also pretty densely distributed, it was nearly impossible to weed, and I defy you to distinguish between wheat, barley, oats and grass.  So we let it do what it wanted, didn't water it, didn't weed it, but did talk to it.

Today I sweltered in the hot morning sun to harvest the grain.  It was hard work as it needed secateurs and as I cut each handful, I then had to triage out the weeds, the grass, the false oats and the heads of wheat and barley that had no seeds in, had been eaten or had gone a bit mouldy.  The resulting harvest is shown here:

Of course, 90% of it is straw - useful for chicken bedding except ours sleep on a broom handle slung across the run.  Then another 5% of it will be chaff, assuming I can get it off somehow - winnowing is fine in principle but, well, you need to have it all broken down a bit first!  So 5% of it will be grains that the chickens may or may not eat, depending on how bolshie they feel - perhaps 3 yoghurt pots or 2 days?  Was it a worthwhile experiment?  I'm not so sure - but lots of learning obviously.

A farmer will sow into drills, having prepared the land rather better.  She will have proper seed rather than repurposed chicken feed, but it will be on the land for 7 or 8 months.  And it can't be any old rough bit of land, or the plants will not grow strong and true.  Timing the harvest is a matter of keen judgement - too early and it will not be ripe, too late and critters will have taken a good portion, and add the weather into the mix, particularly unpredictable storms - not to mention when you can get your hands on the combine harvester and drivers to actually do the harvesting (they are mostly owned by co-operatives or contractors).  Growing grain isn't as easy as it looks!

Carrots can also be a bit tricky but ours are looking OK in between the parsnips.  Not too many parsnips - I think there are about 14 in the mix, but that might well be enough if they do well.  The carrots are a mix of colours, although knowing my luck, it will be the orange ones that make it!

 
 In an excess of hope over reality, I buy cheap bulbs from Aldi, and sometimes I remember to plant them in good time too.  This year I got a packet of fancy gladioli, and at least three of them have come up true and are flowering!

Something that we don't plant, but we don't weed out either is stonecrop and it just lurks around being dull.  This year it has decided to flower and is looking very pretty on the steps to nowhere, guarded by Winnie the Gargoyle, who is also supposed to stop intruders.

Limited action from the trail camera this week as the WiFi watch had run out of juice today, but it is always nice to see the hare passing through.  When passing in daylight, you get some decent action shots too!

Have a good week!