Rural Life

Spring flowers

With the move into March, meteorological spring has now started and we can talk about flowers and buds with joy.  One of the least showy, but most successful spring bulbs round our way are grape hyacinths - you can't stop them it seems and they spread.  These window boxes must have been planted up with bulbs at least 7 years ago, and not by us.  We do nothing to them, and we certainly don't water them through the summer, yet each spring they produce a magnificent display to cheer us up on even the wettest and coldest of March days.

Daffodils can be a bit tetchy, coming up blind if they aren't treated with a bit of respect or if they are too crowded or if the weather isn't to their liking.  This year they are looking rather splendid.

One flower we never seem to have problems with are cowslips, with rosettes turning up everywhere and spreading across any green area they come across.  Later in the season, the mutants will start to flower, with orange and red flowers.  I believe that there are specific names for those, although I do wonder if they are the result of cross-pollination with the polyanthus that are in every garden.  For the moment we are just seeing the early yellow flowers of cowslips however, which are very lovely and a welcome sight.

The hedgerows are white with blackthorn and wild plum blossom, which is gorgeous but makes me worry for the cultivated plum blossom that will arrive soon.  So far only the peach is starting to flower, but that is quite well protected and always early.  Fortunately the Victoria Plum is not showing any sign of thinking that blossom is imminent, but the mirabelle style plum in the Meadow is a bit more optimistic.

Periwinkle can be a real thug, particularly in the wrong place, but in the Orchard it has to fight for its place.  I do love the blue flowers, and prefer the green leaves to the variegated versions.

There is another type of flower that needs my attention at the moment - the sort that is used to decorate the village float for the Comice.  It has taken a while to get a Comité des Fêtes reinvigorated, and a theme agreed for the float, but now that is all sorted, it is all hands on deck to make flowers, ready to be stuck on during May and June.  With 14 willing participants, the first session on Thursday afternoon went really well and was a very convivial event.  We have a way to go though.

There are two trail cameras placed around the ponds to see what wildlife is passing through and next week I will bring one home to check through.  While I have been without a camera, I have used a different technology to see what is going on, this time focussing on bird song.  The Merlin App by Cornell Labs (others are available) sits on my phone and when there isn't too much wind or noise of motors, I can get a view of who is making a racket around me. 

You do have to be a bit circumspect as I am pretty sure the bittern it thought it detected was actually a motorbike misfiring across the valley, but with so many small birds being hard to spot with all the vegetation, it is an eye opener.  The list of 47 species below are all those that have been picked up at least once by the app since the 1st January this year.  I have doubts about just two on this list - the green winged Teal and the European Turtle-dove, but the rest have made enough appearances for me to be confident they are, or have been, in the zone.

Brambling

Carrion crow

Cetti's Warbler

Common buzzard

Common chaffinch

Common chiffchaff

Common firecrest

Common Wood Pigeon

Crested tit

Dunnock

Eurasian Blackbird

Eurasian Blackcap

Eurasian Bluetit

Eurasian Green Woodpecker

Eurasian Jackdaw

Eurasian Jay

Eurasian Linnet

Eurasian Magpie

Eurasian Nuthatch

Eurasian Siskin

Eurasian Skylark

Eurasian Wren

European Goldfinch

European Greenfinch

European Robin

European Serin

European Starling

European Turtle-dove

Gray Wagtail

Great Spotted Woodpecker

Great tit

Green Sandpiper

Green winged Teal

Hawfinch

House Sparrow

Long-tailed tit

Mallard

Marsh tit

Mistle Thrush

Redwing

Reed Bunting

Ring-necked pheasant

Rock Pigeon

Short toed Treecreeper

Song Thrush

White Wagtail

Wood Lark

Anyway, that is more than enough for you to think about for the moment, so I leave you with an image of a small mud slide on the road near the Orchard, because, yes, it has been raining this week!

 

Just an average February

February can be a rough month - if you are older than about 18, there is no real excitement, and certainly by my age, Valentine's Day holds no thrills any more.  The weather can be lovely, sometimes for longer than a couple of hours, and it can be vile.  We had some sunny intervals today, but it was blowing a hoollie and while it went some way to drying the laundry, things are now hanging all over the bathroom as there was a heavy shower.  We must have had an inch of rain in the week, and while that has done good things to the water levels in the ponds, we didn't actually need it.

During one of the nicer hours of weather, I managed to scramble round onto the deer path at the back of the second pond, to get a whole different view.  The pond is clearly leaking water somewhere, so while I had those lovely big fish in there last year, I can't see the pond ever being able to support 10 to 12 inch long fish again.  I'm not sure what has made the pond leak, but I'm sure the environmentalists will tell me when they visit in the spring.

With the longer days, the chickens have more time to consider their raison d'être, and one (I'm fairly sure it is Jacque the Ripper) has started to lay eggs again.  She is pushing out 6 per week, which is nice and enough for a meal and an addition to a pudding but I really need Mack (the Knife) to get back into the swing of things too before I can put away the egg box I take to the market on a Saturday.

I've decided we need to work our way through the leeks we have been growing, not least so the land can be prepared for other crops in the spring.  I lifted 4 rather nice ones and a runt - I could have done without the feline assistance, but Donald made it clear I had no choice.

I have a regular walk to check out all edges of the land and see what is going on.  There are little cul-de-sacs that I go down to check on the various ponds, that are like little spurs off the circuit.  One bit we always go past is a large walnut just uphill from the ponds that seemed to die last year.  It has a number of broken branches held up in the canopy - what the arborists tend to call widow-makers - one of which came down during the week.  While John tidied it up, I looked at another branch that appears to be long dead and needs to come off.  It was well festooned with rather unpleasant fungus.

Last night we pretty well finished this year's truffle fest - there is just the truffle infused camembert to eat up.  They were very aromatic, but the quality was a little patchy.  It was the first time storing them in rice and then using the rice in a risotto has really worked for me, so that was a real plus.  However the stuff going on in life in general has perhaps made me a little less inventive than normal.  It's been very enjoyable, but I hope to do much better next year.  Truffle and prawn risotto is always a winner though!

Anyway, that's all for this week - have a good one!

 

Merry Christmas and all that jazz

Finally it is Christmas Eve.  The winter solstice passed in murky conditions on Friday, but the day before I found a lovely big clump of mistletoe in one of the apple trees - something just right for the Solstice and for Christmas as a pagan symbol of renewal and mystery, and a thing to be avoided in UK pubs over Christmas due to all the kissing.

On Friday night we had our quiet drink in the pub for the end of the week - actually it was heaving, which is a good sign.  We recognised a couple of people, but not many - also a good thing, as the new landlord will need to bring in customers to make it work, and many of those we know in the area are old or work very hard during the week and don't have much money to splash.  Long may it continue (fingers crossed).

Much of the week has been dull and murky, but Wednesday was nice, as is today.  I took advantage on Wednesday and had a wander around the lanes of Baugé, admiring old cottages, weird walls, a plaque showing where the Huguenot temple had been in the period between 1625 or so and 1685, when being protestant became illegal again.  That was the moment many refugees headed for east London, to set up their silk weaving businesses in the Spitalfields area.  Anyway, the plaque is pretty well illegible, but the Tribunal is clear of scaffolding this Christmas, so there is a photo of that instead.

On Thursday we dug up the first of the frosted parsnips, to give away for Christmas dinner - we will dig ours up tomorrow, so they are as fresh as possible.  The tops have looked very good all year, so we were excited as to what we would find.  The first one was big, but there was a small top near it, which I dug up as well and was pleased that it was also a good looking specimen.  I had to cut the bottoms of the roots off, but they were pleasingly long, given our clay base for the soil.

Before today I have marzipaned the cake, the pudding is made, the foie gras is cooked, the shopping is done, and all that remains for tomorrow is a ritual offering to the Oak Tree, digging up carrots and parsnips for us and cooking the festive bird (a locally raised duck).  That meant that this morning we were entitled to play, particularly as there was a bit of wind.  We dug out the cheap kite we bought four years ago, clipped the crossbar back in and spent a happy half hour flying it in the Meadow, while not falling down the badger's set entrance.  Mr Banks got it right, we reckon!

So, may your kite fly high and not get caught in trees, may your gravy be without lumps and your Christmas pudding ignite with the first match.  Have a wonderful Christmas!

 

Summer has arrived.

There is a massive and stable high over the British Isles and a depression in the Mediterranean, and in between, here in northern France, we are enjoying summer conditions, and have been doing so for two weeks now.  It's good for the hay crop but not so good for germinating fodder beet I gather.  It is actually marvellous at the moment for getting seeds to come up.  Last weekend the big excitement was the hourly popping up of new butternut squashes and courgettes, while this weekend the excitement is over jalapeño chillies.  Over at the Plot, heritage carrots came up in a week and parsnips are showing their first seeds leaves after two weeks, while nearly half of the sweetcorn sown last week is now up.  All this makes me feel very good.  In addition, the roses are fabulous - here is a magnificent one called Orange King, bought as a memorial to a much loved ginger cat.  Last year it had perhaps 3 rather dingy flowers, this year it is amazing!

The wildflower meadow is now definitely past its best, with the oxeye daisies nearly over, the linseed gone to seed, the pink clovers done, the pretty orchids mostly faded and the lizard orchids taking over in their rather dull fashion.  In a couple of weeks, we will need to think about mowing the meadow to keep undesirables at bay (old man's beard, bramble, small cherry trees), spread the seed from this lot of flowers and allow a better growing environment for the late summer and autumn flowers including field scabious.  At the moment, the knapweed is still pretty spectacular where it is to be found, and some late bee orchids provide a bit of interest in the shade.

The trail camera has had its batteries boosted and I have spent some time starting to go through the downloaded files - but it takes an age to work through the video files to decide what is worth keeping or not, and I have to be in the right mood.  There was no doubting that this rather nice clip of Woody doing his thing in the spring was worth keeping!

There was a pretty definitive viewing of the coypu too - he has a look to my mind of a stuffy colonial colonel wandering around chuntering to himself, but perhaps I am influenced by the old Animal Magic series and thinking what sort of voice Johnny Morris would have put to this fellow.  

It is always a joy to see the hare, and with the long evenings and the current placement of the camera, you do get some rather sweet close up videos such as this one.  That nose!  Those ears!

I think this is also a hare, but the eyes are a bit different.

Other old friends (fiends?) are back in the zone too - our chums the boar are back and making a mess in one of the ponds.  The pond with the fish, so I would prefer it if they didn't make too much of a mess, those poor fish have enough problems to cope with at the moment!

Again, rather nice photos as the light was good when they were passing through at 8:45pm one evening.  I'm glad I wasn't there to see them, but then I guess they wouldn't have come through if they thought I was there!

Anyway, it is time to enjoy a summer afternoon in the garden under the abri, as we spent time getting the cover out, mended and installed for the summer yesterday.  Sing along to the Kinks - Lazing on a sunny afternoon, in the summertime!

Until next week....

 

Something weird happened during the week

The first I knew about it was when I was walking down through the Orchard, admiring some newly appeared bee orchids.

I thought the long grass looked a bit odd and assumed that either young badgers had come out of the set and had been dancing around, or that the local boar had been through on their way to dig up a neighbouring field.  But then I found other evidence that had nothing to do with pigs or boar or badgers.

So I carried on down to the ponds, and there found a lot of the shrubbery had been pushed around and broken and someone had been wading in my pond!

I doubt the fish were happy when it happened, and they aren't happy now, as there is so little water available for them.  I am hoping to get someone in, to get them out, and transfer them to a deeper pond.  I will be sorry to see them go of course, but I don't think they will survive the summer in our pond.

Yes, some neighbouring heifers got bored, broke through the single strand of electric fence, followed the path the hunters take, and gambolled in the Orchard before being taken away again (the wire has been reconnected it appears).  As far as I can tell, there is no film or photo of this episode on the trail camera, as it was pointing in slightly the wrong direction, but I will be checking when I download all the files, as it is home to have its batteries recharged.

In the meantime, here are two different hares passing through.

Have a good week!

 

Lovely flowers - both wild and cultivated

Last week i said that if I remembered I would focus on flowers, including the wild orchids that are doing the rounds at the moment.  The early ones are starting to fade, the late ones are yet to get into their stride and the middle ones are coming out nicely, so let's start with a few of the wild things.

My favourite of the lot is the bee orchid - nearly impossible to spot until it comes out, once the rosettes of leaves are hidden by other things, and it doesn't like the competition of the full on wildflower meadow, but on the edges of mown bits (and if we had rabbits and sheep to nibble things, on the edge of nibbled patches) there can be quite large clumps.

A garden that has been not exactly neglected, but which has seen fewer people visiting it than normal has a veritable lawn of orchids that in previous years we have identified as fly orchids - not as pretty as the bee orchid, in fact a little bit sinister, they are also a lot rarer.

The lady orchid is a fairly classic pyramid style orchid, with quite dramatic variation in colour on the plant itself - empirical evidence from the meadow says that they are spread by badgers running past them, although I'm sure that can't be right.  The three we have are all on a badger path however, so that's how I see it.  This one also has a bee orchid beside it.

The lizard orchids are not yet doing their thing - dramatic but not as pretty or delicate as these.  The wildflower meadow is probably at its peak at the moment, full of ox eye daisies, knapweed, pink clover, the last fading flowers of linseed, and bits and bobs of other things, including orchids where a path has been mown, and comfrey dotted around.  At the moment it is humming with insects too, but the main reason for leaving it a while yet before we mow to allow new things to come up (scabious, more pink clover, etc) is that hares and deer will leave leverets and fauns in little nests in the long, lush greenery while they go out foraging.  The leverets won't move when they hear a mower and are often too small to be seen, while the fauns become disorientated.  It's best to wait a month or two!

Today we went out to the garden centre Jacques Briant - normally I am not allowed there with a bank card, as the plants are so lush and lovely and I buy way too many.  Today we were on a mission for one of John's clients and found their requirements pretty easily and reasonably priced too (this is not a cheap place).  As we had done well with those, I was allowed to splash out on some obscenely bright petunias which were actually quite reasonably priced.  But as we headed to the check out, we went past a place with single pots of petunias, but special ones and I could not resist this one, which actually looked like it was covered with glitter!  Now to find a pot to do it justice and keep it away from the evil vampire slugs that are out and about at the moment at night!

Two of our regular and reliable perennials are out and putting on a fine show at the moment - the wall based campanula that seems to be rooted in a bit of dust in the wall, and the red hot pokers we brought over with us 19 years ago from Worcester.  Actually they are from the allotment next door to ours, and I've always adored them.

So that's it for this week, but next week there will be more tails of the hares to share with you, plus news of anything else exciting that is going on.

 

 

Not staying on top of things

I set off on my glorious adventure to the UK something like two and a half weeks ago, and I have been home for a week and I am still chasing my tail trying to catch up on all fronts.  I've not downloaded the lovely photos of the Broads and my visit to the UK, I've not written up my notes from my visit, I've not caught up with all my clients in France, I've not planted all the potatoes yet, I've not got to grips with the garden or the window boxes or the fridge or planning meals or anything.  I feel totally inadequate! 

Yesterday we did do the village "vide grenier" or car boot sale, so actually getting anything sorted out for that was a last minute effort, and we didn't have as much stuff on display as perhaps we would have liked.  But we were there!

Actually it was probably rather a good thing that we didn't have too much stuff out on display, and certainly no books or clothes.  That was a deliberate choice as the weather the day before wasn't brilliant.  Even so we got rid of some big items, although we did feel a bit mugged by two wee munchkins who cut down our ticket price on a cauldron by 50%!  Still, when the rain came, it was heavy and quite long duration, so it was good we didn't have fabrics other than the table covering.

We hung on for another hour, but there were no paying punters, so we legged it early and were able to spend time drying everything we hadn't sold and putting it away carefully for next year.  

The trail camera has moved and been installed on a track used a lot by the local fauna.  The grass around it was very long, so there has been limited action, although a nice bunny did pop up one day.

Rather less appealing and also rather less welcome was a suspected sighting of a coypu.  As we are desperate to keep the water in the ponds to support the 5 rather large fish (plus the army of noisy frogs and the ducks), we don't really want coypu digging into the banks and potentially draining the pools into the ditches below.  They are also a non-native, invasive species that really has no place in France, and certainly not somewhere where there is very little water held in the wetland anyway.

A much more welcome visitor was this Red Admiral butterfly I found yesterday sunning himself after a shower.  My Dad used to make up stories for me about a Red Admiral and a Painted Lady, which I am sure had a subversive subtext.  It is a shame I can't remember any of them, and that he didn't write any down as far as I know.

We had a visitor of a different sort today at the Garden - easy enough for me to hear, as I was having mud smeared over me by a cat, but it wasn't until it was nearly overhead that John heard it over the noise of the rotavator and through his ear protectors.  The Air Force still use the local airport, even though little else does nowadays, and this looks like a pretty heavy cargo plane - possibly one used for refuelling others in flight?  I'm sure someone will tell me!

We also went for a walk around the One Acre Wood to admire the lily of the valley, see some wild medlar flowers, and be enchanted by the veil of green that has crept up on us.  It was rather sadder to see that a number of the large chestnuts have not survived some very difficult growing conditions.  First it was the new invasive wasp that targeted sweet chestnuts, and weakened them by growing its young in the leaf buds.  Then the plot next door was clear felled about three years ago, changing the light and drainage patterns.  Then last year's drought and fierce heat, and finally a dry February all seem to have contributed to a number of trees having no leaves at all this year.  While good for our heating needs, we have to hope that cutting down the dead trees will encourage new growth from the boles, as many are several hundred years old.

• 
• 
• 
• 

I don't know if the last photo will come out when you read this - but I really can't bear trying to reload them all again!

Finally here is a purple orchid we spotted in a ditch near the wood - they seem a bit late this year, and I am observing the progress of the bee orchids as I think we have a problem!

Until next week!

 

 

Starting the gardening season

I don't know why, but we haven't really been inspired to get this year's gardening underway so far.  We have planted shallots and onions, which are now sprouting, and of course in the last weeks of 2022 we sowed our broad beans, but other than that we've not done much.

• 
• 

Over winter, we have been able to enjoy fresh parsley, parsnips, chard, leeks and the stored potatoes (now all gone), but yesterday we had a few spears of feral asparagus which acted as a reminder that if we want to feed ourselves, we need to get ourselves into gear!  After all, we do have 53 seed potatoes chitting away, which will need to be planted soon.

The chard will keep going for a while and there is a hint of cauliflower on the six plants that are still also providing ample food for caterpillars.  There is also corn salad hiding away among the weeds that have grown back, which I hope to rescue soon.

The state of the rhubarb reminds us that we need to care for the soil, adding organic matter back where we can, while at the same time continuing to fight the good fight against the rampant scrub that wants to reclaim the gardens.  These tulips were planted in a vegetable bed only 3 years ago, but are now fighting their way out of a bramble patch.

• 
• 

Those plants that fight on through the weeds and scrub come out stronger - this calendular made it through the winter and is now developing many more flower buds for more blazing orange.

One reason for our lassitude to date is that for once things are a bit delayed in nature.  The daffodils would have been finished by now last year and the year before, while the cowslips are just going from strength to strength.  But blossom is late - the countryside is white with wild plum and blackthorn much later than normal, while the pear may not be in full bloom for Easter, as it usually would be (irrespective of date, as Easter is determined by moon phases).  There is a slow green veil taking over but that has been apparent in late March for the last few years, not early April.

• 
• 

The birds are out in force, but there were few insects around, despite the blossom and the highly pungent laurel flowers.  The hornet trap is set at The Shack but not at home, but there is no sign of any interest in it so far.  There are a few heavy bumblebees around, but without insects, there will not be much fruit, so I hope they appear soon.

The extremely clear sign of a late spring was at the One Acre Wood however.  For the past few years, by the start of April, the lily of the valley would be perhaps an inch or two tall and showing whether there would be any flowers to come.  We walked through the spot today, and could see nothing.  Absolutely nothing.  They will sprout in due course, but they confirm we are right not to be plunging into too much gardening activity before Nature is ready to give us a helping hand.

Many the Easter Bunny bring you more chocolate than you can eat in one sitting!

 

Thinking about spring

Although it's March, it's not quite spring yet, but something is definitely stirring out there.  Of course some say that spring starts at the beginning of March and I can quite see that, but I'm going to wait for the equinox this year before I call it.  It's not that we have had snow this last week - far from it, in fact.  Today we had the hammock out for the first time this year, and pronounced it to be good.  I had a lovely quarter of an hour, relaxing, covered in large cats, and for part of the time at least, watching a magnificent woodpecker in one of the walnut trees.

I did do some spring-like work in the potager, in that I got around to planting the yellow onion sets I bought a few weeks ago.  Someone on one of the forums who is a bit further north than us talked about having their onion sets planted between the autumn sown broad beans, so that when the beans are done in June or so, the onions can let rip and use the nitrogen fixed by the bean roots.  Someone else poo-pooed that, but on the forums you can normally find someone who will swear blind that black is white.  Anyway, why not give it a whirl?  The onions can't really do any worse than they did last year!!

The plants are certainly starting to get into the swing of things.  The daffodils are coming out, although the more fancy narcissi are a long way behind, and the anemones I planted back at the end of 2021 are putting on another good display this year.

• 
• 

No trail camera images this week I'm afraid, but a distant view of a small flock of cattle egrets along with next door farmer's cattle, doing whatever cattle egrets do.  I first became aware of them six years ago, when we went to Guadeloupe.  There, people park a cow anywhere where there is a bit of grass, and then each cow seems to have up to a dozen attendant egrets.  But now we have huge flocks of them in mainland France, some with more than a hundred birds, like a snow drift across a field.  I gather it is a sign of climate change as they have moved north from Africa.  They are lovely to look at but not right in the scheme of things.

I spotted something else that doesn't seem right yesterday too.  I was looking at the ponds at the bottom of The Orchard - I am now the proud owner of a pond dipping kit and was checking them out, to plan my first play.  I was hoping to spot a bit of spawn perhaps.  I didn't see any spawn, but was pleased that the level of the ponds has risen a bit with the recent rain, although we need so much more as they are a good 6 to 8 inches below where they should be at this time of year.  Then I heard a swish and a plop and looking across, saw the back and dorsal fin and tail of a rather large fish - when I say large, probably about 8 to 10 inches long.  Naturally it took a while for me to remember to get my phone out to take a picture and it was too far away, but I got something anyway, as you can see.  No, really!  My bumper book of Freshwater Fish says it could be Roach or Rudd, but to me the bigger questions are how did it get there, why haven't I seen it before, what does it live on and will it survive?

Today from The Shack we needed to visit another property, to check on something, and the easiest route, or at least the route we took, went through the area devastated by the forest fire last summer.  I got out of the car to take a couple of pictures and also a video.  It was most odd.  It was very quiet - no trees for the wind to rustle through, few birds, certainly many fewer than at The Shack, where they are raucous at the moment, and an overwhelming scent of pine, like someone had been spraying toilet duck around.  I hope that in a few weeks plants will start to reappear, as the black ground is chilling to look at.

So that's it for this week - I'm not sure what will be on the menu next week, but am sure that nature and life will surprise me!

 

 

 

Winter activity

January is doing what January does - mostly it is cold, sometimes it is wet too.  Anticyclones at this time of year tend to mean that any moist air is trapped at low levels giving annoying, thin cloud, mist and fog, and if the air is dry, you can see for miles but it is jolly cold.  We've been having a bit of both of those, and quite frankly I am fed up with having cold feet, even when wearing my fleecy socks.  But the views can be lovely!

There are of course the hints that spring will happen - birds have been incredibly noisy the last week, and today there were woodpeckers hammering morse code messages to each other, and a thrush dealing with the last of the walnuts and any snails it can find.  Looking down there are many orchid rosettes appearing - they won't all flower this year, but the corms will be building resources - as well as timid snowdrops and the early signs of the swathes of narcissus that will adorn the top of the Meadow in a few weeks' time.  At the other end of the scale, cyclamen corms are rebuilding their strength after a prolific flowering season in the autumn, but the leaves will start to fade as the spring bulbs take over.

• 
• 
• 
• 

The trail camera has moved and last Sunday, after I had been and downloaded images, there was deer activity.

• 
• 

This is a particularly cheeky shot!

The badger is also out and about, but only at night!

• 
• 
• 

Finally, there was also a boar and a fox doing the rounds.

• 
• 

The past week has also been Truffle Week, but with a few more meals to go, I will save a recipe by recipe account of 100g of best black truffle for next week.