Rural Life

New year, new promise?

Last blog was all about looking back, today is more about looking forward as the days start to lengthen and we stop thinking about how to celebrate midwinter and concentrate more on what the new year has to offer.

On the last day of the old year, it was unseasonably warm.  Now it is always hard for a gardener to hold back on sowing things and planting things, because that is what it is all about, making things grow.  That challenge is even harder when it is mild and you see buds developing and catkins shedding pollen everywhere (and so the start of the new season allergies).  However I felt justified in doing a bit of sowing, as I hadn't got around to the second patch of broad beans, and I like to do autumn sowing to avoid the worst ravages of blackfly.  So I uncovered a nicely clean bed, raked it over to remove any foolhardy weeds and a bit more of the underlying builders' rubble, made about 88 dents and sowed broad bean Aquadulce Claudia.  I then raked soil back over and added a nice long piece of netting to avoid the worst ravages of cat bottom.  I guess it will be another 3 weeks or so before the shoots show.

• 
• 

Another major winter occupation is firewood - now is a good time to fell as the trees are quiet, not too much sap around or leaves to encumber the fall, we aren't worried about missing mushrooms and we aren't being attacked by mosquitos.  We've brought down two trees so far this winter and want to bring down another couple to ensure continuity.  We had clearly grown soft this summer as moving the dead/dry pieces up to the top of the One Acre Wood is proving harder work than in previous years and neither of us have really felt that our elbows are in a suitable condition for doing a lot of splitting with an axe, however satisfying it can be.  We borrowed a log splitter which made short work of the existing stash of big logs, which are now ready for use.

• 
• 

We are still eating the fruits of last year's gardening, and the Brussel Sprouts seem to be nearly ready for John to crunch his way through.  I won't touch them.  Next weekend we will have our first red cabbage, but I fear that the cauliflower plants, that grew so large and lush, won't have the reserves to make good curds in February/March.  I mentioned that it was unseasonably warm?  Today I found them covered once again by caterpillars!

It is good at this time of year to look around and appreciate what we take for granted.  Two examples of this.  Firstly I was in a neighbouring village for a work appointment, and rather than park at the client's house, I parked by the church.  Once the work was done, as I put my stuff back in the car, and changed sweatshirt to one that the cats could and would dribble on, I took a moment to marvel at the magnificent St Médard church in Cheviré le Rouge.  It's not the largest village by any means, but perhaps 800 or 900 years ago it was way more important, and deserved this large and impressive church.

Looking down, once at the Orchard and having a bit of a walk, I marvelled at the intricate patterns of cyclamen leaves and was perhaps a bit concerned at the number and size of orchid rosettes under the big walnut tree.  The cyclamen flowers in the autumn were magnificent.  The orchids are most likely to be lizard orchids - impressive, particularly when there are a lot of them, but not pretty.

• 
• 

I'm travelling next week, so there may be photos from other places next Sunday!

 

Blooming May

This week it's all about flowers - we've had no rain since the 24th April and while there is still a fair amount of moisture around, the forecast is for a hot 10 days, which will fry things out rather.  There are water restrictions here already, which should stop any watering between 10am and 8pm, but you still see the vast water jets on farms, which doesn't sit well when gardeners are being told that only vegetable plots can be watered and then only "reasonably".  I think if you have planted new trees during the winter, there is also generally a derogation for that, but no watering established shrubs or borders, no watering lawns, and no filling swimming pools (yeah, right, like people are going to obey that one!).

On the cultivated flower front, we are in my favourite season - irises!  The selection below are red from our garden, mauve from the Chinon garden, black and white (well, very dark purple and white) from the edge of the wildflower meadow, and Dutch irises from by The Shack.

• 
• 
• 
• 

Then there are the things that are cultivated, or sort of cultivated, such as the campanula, the semper vivum baskets that are starting to overflow (although not strictly flowers, they are quite magnificent I think), the mix of self-seeded forget-me-knots and purple flowers which might be phacelia, and the deep red poppies that also spread themselves around from last year's display of bee-friendly flowers.

• 
• 
• 
• 

The wildflower meadow is really getting into its stride and you can see the masses of white oxeye daisies, while around the area there are great fountains of false acacia flowers, humming with bees.  If you sit near a group of these, you can even smell the honey - acacia honey is very popular, very pale and not strongly flavoured, assuming you can find single variety honeys.  L'Or de la Ruche in St Martin d'Arcé makes a particular feature of the different types of honey based on what was flowering near the hives, be it colza, sunflowers, chestnut, acacia, meadow flowers or summer flowers.

• 
• 

The first couple of bee orchids are out, and I am particularly pleased with this photo of one.

Sunny weather, flowering meadows, a feeling that summer is really on its way all add up to one thing - a need for ice cream.  This year one of the local farms has opened a creamery to sell milk, cream, cheeses, yoghurts as well as its headline product - ice cream.  It isn't cheap, but it is very good!  We are working our way through the flavours.  The vanilla is long gone, but we are currently on Rum Raisin, Pistachio, and eeking out the most amazing chocolate one.  What will I buy this week???

Have a good one!

 

Sunshine and badgers

Happy May Day - and apologies to those in the UK as I gather the weather isn't too great - here it is lovely and has been for a while.  Sunshine, gentle cooling breezes and blue skies, which of course also means hosepipe bans and water restrictions.  It is the earliest I remember there being a ban on watering non-essentials using well or tap water.  Fortunately we have stocks of rainwater, and vainly hope that it will rain sometime soon - the earliest forecast is for around the 13th May!!

The sunshine does mean that there are some lovely things to photograph at the moment - distant chateau before they disappear behind foliage, but are nicely framed by green, orchids (although the bee orchid season will start soon and I'm sure that will get boring), lizards, butterflies, tadpoles and a vide grenier (literally empty your attic - the French version of a car boot, and all day affairs).

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• 

The wildflower meadow is really coming into its own, with oxeye daisies, linseed, and bright pink clover - the bee orchids will join in shortly as they seem to go well alongside the clovers.  We mowed a trail round, so that you can walk round without worrying about treading on something precious or getting too many ticks on your clothes, as the hares and deer also like the meadow.  You can't take a decent photo of a wildflower meadow really, as the camera can't work as well as the eye for taking it all in.  By contrast, I show an area by the fruit trees where we haven't mown, and nature is springing back with all the "best" things in life - nettles, mares tail and bramble.

We now have aubergines planted out under individual mini-cloches and some lettuce under protection from cat bums - I am hoping the resident thrushes will do the needful with slugs and snails as I found this year's well used anvil.

Anyway, I also said something about badgers.  We moved the trail camera to near the set in the hope of getting a sight of cubs at dawn or dusk.  For the first few days there was no action at all.  Then a couple of days ago I checked and there were lots of files, although on my phone they didn't look like much - but I downloaded a few photographs and a couple of videos anyway.  Away from sunlight and with a pair of glasses, I could see there was actually quite a bit of action, so today I downloaded a further random selection and there is quite a lot of activity.  The following five short films show the hunt for food as young cubs need sustenance, all done at night.

 

 

 

And finally...

Have a good week!

 

 

Getting serious about food production

I had intended a week of intense sowing and planting and weeding activity - well best laid plans and all that, something else came up, but having said that, we aren't doing too badly.  The first 27 potatoes I planted at the end of March are now all showing above the weed suppressant mat, while some of the second batch of 18 are also showing signs.  The final dollop planted last week won't show for a while yet - or so I assume.  The rows of garlic, shallots and onions are doing OK despite being rolled on from time to time by itchy cats - the shallots look very vigorous while the onions are slowly starting to show growing shoots.  They went in rather later than the shallots and have suffered more from cat attentions and being picked out by birds. 

• 
• 

The broad beans all now have pods set, and as they have stopped flowering and are starting to show signs of blackfly, I have taken out the tops and they can concentrate on filling out those pods.  The speedy cabbages aren't really proving to be that speedy, despite a month with a cover on them, but are starting to look more convincing now, while the radishes sown among them will be ready this week, particularly if we have a bit more rain.

• 
• 

Today was really devoted to sowing.  I carried on cleaning up the rotavated potato bed, although we aren't planting any more spuds.  Instead, while investigating my seed stash, I found an old packet of purple mangetout seeds, so I bashed in three poles, surrounded them with three former tree guards, and sowed a circle of peas around each.  I finished off that bit with a dense row of very cheap parsley seed - either they will grow, or they won't, we wait and see. 

John rotavated a bit of the potato bed from two years ago, cleaned it up a bit and spent a happy while sowing half of a cheap packet of dwarf french beans and half a packet of radish (18 jour variety) seeds.  If even half the seeds we sowed today come up, we will eat well in between 3 and 10 weeks time!

• 
• 

The wildflower meadow is getting ready to burst into flower, so John took the opportunity to mow a path around the edge and along the line of fruit trees.  At the edge, under a cherry tree there are two early orchids flowering beautifully, but the main show of bee orchids won't start for two to three weeks yet.  The lizard orchids are starting to send up spikes, but they will be in full splendour in three to four weeks.  In the meantime, the ox eye daisies and clovers will put on a magnificent show, while the field scabious prepares to take over from them.  The better soil of the garden has a wonderful undercurrent of deep blue speedwell in it, while the bathroom orchid has finally bloomed again.

• 
• 
• 
• 

Not much activity on the trail camera front this week - well lots of activity but too speedy for anything interesting.  The badger passing through was the best shot.  The camera has moved on - we are hoping for film of young badgers putting their noses out of the set, but realise it is a long shot (in every sense).  There was an Easter Sunday Excalirock festival at our local pub, so we went along - great to see people out and about again, and to enjoy the punkabilly of D-Track - a local group of people old enough to know better, but who are really energetic and fun.  My camera just about managed a photo of that, but wilted at trying to get a video!

• 
• 

Have a good week!

 

Spuds we like!

Happy Spring!  And we have had a full week of sunny and warm weather which has brought out a lot of fruit blossom, pretty well done for the narcissi, and sent the cowslips into overdrive.  We'd thought it wasn't going to be a good year for them, but they have gone over the top.  There are more than ever of the red and orange ones and some odd variations which make us think that they may well hybridise with polyanthus.  This would explain the red and orange variants and also the rather odd one with primrose flowers on cowslip style stems!

• 
• 

The honesty is also putting on a great display this year.  It is a biannual so these are the ones that germinated last year and it must have been a good year for that.  Wandering through the Orchard and Wildflower Meadow, I can seen hundreds, if not thousands, of orchid rosettes preparing for May.  They are spreading further and further as we get rid of the scrub, and the choking nettles and old man's beard, and will now curtail our ability to mow anything more than a path around the Meadow and Orchard for the next few months.  However I did spot one with a hairy caterpillar on it.  If there is a specific orchid butterfly or moth, then it has found the right place, if not, it will be bird food!!

• 
• 

It was a major fail with the trail camera this week, which was a bit of a surprise after last week's excitement.  I only moved it about 20 feet, so should have seen the same level of action, but all I caught were two pigeons.  When I looked into the field behind where the camera was, I had an interesting, if one-sided, conversation with 5 young heifers, which might explain the lack of deer and boar.  The camera has moved on now.

Which brings us on to the potatoes.  We started to develop the allotment patches in the Garden in 2019, and now we are back to the first patch for potatoes, after growing them in two other plots in 2020 and 2021.  The soil was industrial clay with builder's rubble when we started (perhaps harsh, but that's what it felt like), but we have added a lot of organic material since.  I am told that rotavating was hard work, but not as bad as it has been, and certainly cleaning up what had been turned wasn't as bad as it has been.  I also added 5 sacks of real leaf mould before covering up the ground with weed suppressant matting and planting the seed potatoes through it.  We've gone with second earlies again this year - it worked in our favour last year, as the tops were dying off as blight started to hit, so we weren't affected.  The resulting tubers aren't as huge as main crop can be, but the variety we choose is versatile and also stores well.  We are still eating last year's crop!  So half done, the other half to do over the next couple of weeks, depending on the weather.

• 
• 
• 

Finally, in the saga of Bridie the Freeloading Bantam, she might perhaps be relenting a bit about sharing eggs with us.  She has found a way of getting into the chicken run (but can't get out again, which is weird), and laid an egg in the coop, which I scooped up with the eggs from the other chickens.  Then no more eggs, until I approached the chicken run from a different angle and found she had decided to lay in their "field shelter".  So we took those, and very tasty they were too.  Another egg appeared in the coop, which I left, and the following day, there was another one!  They are quite small but very white!

Have a good week!

 

 

 

Winter jobs and weather

While conservation organisations would like us to do nothing during the winter in the gardens and green areas we manage, that is a bit too utopian to be feasible.  Don't cut anything back until the spring they say, but then in the spring you mustn't cut stuff back because it is nesting season, you must wait until high summer.  Except you mustn't cut back things in the summer, when they are flowering and fruiting and providing nourishment for wildlife, but then in the autumn you mustn't cut things back either as things need seeds and protected areas to shelter and hibernate in.  If you follow that reasoning, of course, you never do anything and a wild area becomes a place of impenetrable scrub which nothing much likes.  The birds don't even eat the blackberries and they shrivel up on the briars and are very itchy if you get them on your skin or down your shirt.  This is not vibrant wild land!

So, John has been strimming it back, keeping an eye out for wildlife, but seeing none, not even a duck on the pond hidden in all that skank.  The toads will be abroad soon, and later in the summer, the dragonflies will be on patrol, but otherwise those are quite uninteresting ponds (or so I think, but I will do some dipping later in the year).

In addition, we have pruned one of the juicing apple trees - it was so overgrown with branches crossing, that it was impossible for the apples to fall off!  We removed the branch with the massive mistletoe - we have others, so don't need that one, and cut out a lot of wood, including dead branches.  Many were weighed down with moss and lichen, so that it was hard to tell the primary function of the tree!

• 
• 

The signs of spring are ever more visible, although there is a lot of weather to go first I suspect.  In sheltered spots of the ground there are narcissi up and in some cases, flowering.  I had forgotten where I planted a load of anemone bulbs last autumn, but they are now showing, and I really didn't think I planted them through a poppy!  The late woodland snowdrops are coming up, with one flower bud to show for it, and the garlic I planted a few days ago in a low polytunnel are showing decent sized shoots.  But things are later than last year, as there are no cowslip flowers up yet. 

There are orchids everywhere!

• 
• 
• 
• 

And then there have been storms.  Dudley was too far north to affect us.  Eunice meant we had some reasonable squalls of wind and rain on Friday, but fortunately nothing much over 75kmph or so - nasty if you were out in it.  Franklin or whatever he is called means we have annoying gusts that hit my office roof with an alarming sound, but again not too bad.  On Monday we had thunderstorms though, which are a bit rare at this time of year.  There were lightening strikes within a kilometre of the house and heavy rain - not much fun!

Bad weather means it isn't easy to get scaffolding up, so we would respectfully request some nice, dull weather so that the masons can get the frame up and do what needs to be done to the chimney!  Hopefully there will be news on that next week!

 

Hope springs eternal

First off, Happy Belated Burn's Night to my Scottish chums.  In your honour, we broached our second to last tin of haggis (it is now considered contraband to bring it in - one of those gifts of Brexit), and served it with roasted potatoes from our own production (tatties), creamed swede (neeps) and onion gravy (not a drop of whisky in the house - shock, horror).  It was delicious and there was enough left over for a nice snack lunch, hot on buttered toast.

This week's location for the trail camera was, if anything, even more frustrating than the last two.  There is evidence of activity in the zone and when I checked it on Tuesday, there were 92 files saved!  I left it in situ for the rest of the week and took it down yesterday, all eager to see what had been cavorting around for my entertainment.  There were the usual shots of me leaving and arriving, and 89 files showing the sun moving around, condensation drying off, the ambient temperature rising from -1ºC and frosty to 5ºC and sunny over the space of three quarters of an hour.  And in all that time, the only thing moving and setting off the camera?  A dead leaf on the Old Man's Beard!  It was also clearly the only time that there was any sort of breeze during the whole week, which apart from that one morning, was dull, foggy, dank, overcast and really rather cold.  Here is the offending leaf - the camera has moved to another spot, which I hope gets something!

This weekend is the RSPB's Garden Bird Watch weekend, which is also running with a French bird charity too.  The evidence from a week in a secluded orchard where no birds set off the camera is not entirely hopeful for wildlife.  In all seriousness, over the past fortnight, the hunters have "been through" twice round The Shack and seem to have frightened off pretty well everything other than a couple of very dedicated mallard and the small garden birds.  Today we did not manage to raise a pheasant, which we can normally do.  As they are only supposed to be hunting boar, any claims that the hunters are supporting local wildlife seem a bit spurious to me currently.

On a happier note, spring isn't here yet, but it is definitely on it's way.  There are bright yellow catkins around the edge of the One Acre Wood, snowdrops coming up under our quince tree and the daffodils and narcissus around the edge of the Wildflower Meadow are starting to show.

• 
• 
• 

Looking forward, I'm sure wildlife will be back - roaming around today, we found someone's stash of stolen maize husks and a hole in the fence to the farmer's field with well worn tracks all around.  They may be elsewhere currently, but I'm sure things will come back.  Looking even further forward, the cyclamen are spreading well where we have transplanted corms and the flowers have set seed.  Perhaps in 20 years or so the area will be a carpet of white flowers in the early autumn!

• 
• 

One thing we have learned, badgers are not put off by coffee grounds.  Back to the drawing board on that one!

 

Location, location, location

After three very good weeks with the trail camera, I sadly have to announce a complete failure this week.  We chose a location that was away from the road and surrounded by dense undergrowth, near a water source and with tracks in many directions, seemingly used by animals large and small.  When we collected the camera yesterday, there were 6 files on it, with the least awful photo below.  The others included mainly my bottom retreating from the camera or me getting up close to turn it off.  Clearly that area is not in use at the moment, possibly as the hunt were through last weekend, possibly as it isn't an interesting area at this time of year.  I'll try again there in the spring or summer, but for now the camera has moved on.

So what else has been going on this week?  The gastronomy fest continues, with more truffle influenced meals.  We are using up the last bit of the truffle tonight and that is it until early 2023.  We also had lunch out at our favourite restaurant, and honestly it was hard to move after our 12,55 Euros a head blow out.  I've not had that good a bavette steak for years, while the chocolate mousse was positively intoxicating in its chocolatiness.  

• 
• 
• 

In order to recover from all the rich food, and to keep warm, we have had to spend time in the One Acre Wood, taking down and chopping up a long dead chestnut tree.  Yesterday we did the felling and sectioning.  There was freezing fog and everywhere was covered in white tendrils as the fog froze onto spider web.  When all was still you could actually hear the ice crystals falling off.  Today we went back with the trailer and a splitting axe (or merlin) and tidied up the largesse, splitting much of it to make it usable.  Reading back over past memories, ten years ago I was able to split a stère of wood almost single handed, but this year I managed about 8 logs.  Mind you, that is an improvement on last year, when I could do almost nothing with a dodgy elbow.

• 
• 

We support a cat charity locally called Cat's Garfield - they catch, sterilise and rehome, as far as possible, feral and stray cats in the area.  This weekend they were trying to educate people and raise a bit of cash through an exhibition of photos taken by one of their members, a half-English lady who has just started up as a photographer in the area.  The pictures were lovely and it is also nice to hear the good news stories of adoptions.  What impressed us most was the venue - a converted chapel.  The downstairs was pleasant with nice features, the upstairs was breath-taking.

To close, a final picture of the frost in the wild clematis Old Man's Beard, which surrounds the wildflower meadow and strangles all the fruit trees, and much else besides.  The birds don't seem to be interested in the seed heads, but when the freezing fog does its thing, they are rather pretty.  Fingers crossed for some interesting footage from the trail camera next week!

 

Happy New Year - 2022, the Year of the Pheasant?

Happy New Year to chums near and far.  And a healthy one too, which is on my mind as others have been "pinged" in our close circle and it's a worry.

The period between Christmas and New Year is always an odd one, and this year is no exception.  The weather has been unseasonably mild, and the last couple of days have been gloriously sunny too.  Yesterday morning there was a hint of mist, which made going up the garden to feed the chickens a slightly spooky affair, as can be seen.

• 
• 

The mist burnt off very quickly though, and both yesterday and today we have sat out with cats, watched birds, done some gardening and enjoyed nature.  It was lovely to get the hammocks out again today and sit in The Garden watching the tits and a robin working their way through a coconut filled with fat and seeds.  I was surprised to see the robin doing that in fact, as I thought it really was a trick of blue tits and great tits.  We do actively encourage great tits in The Garden as they are the only bird to have decided to eat pine processionary caterpillars, and with nests in a couple of the pine trees round the garden, encouraging them seems like a good idea.  A friend did happily point out that great tits also predate bats, but if my bats live where I think they do, no great tit could get into the space!

The weather is also conducive to good, dramatic sunsets - this was yesterday's.

The French make a big deal of the Reveillon as they tend to call it and New Year, although this year the festivities were more muted due to the charm free Omicron.  In previous years, we have gorged on foie gras, smoked salmon, steak, oysters (occasionally done as Angels on horseback with bacon and prunes), but this year we went for tartiflette, a delicious mix of potatoes (home grown of course), smoked bacon, onion, garlic and Reblouchon cheese.  We didn't eat all this pan, we did save some to go with sausages today!

Wandering around the grounds today, we spotted this rather dramatic and interesting fungus - I might work out what it is by next week!  So bright that I wondered if it was a piece of plastic brought in by one of the foxes in the Orchard, it stood out among the detritus under one of the walnut trees.

And so to the Year of the Pheasant.  The trail camera has been in a very tucked away part of the Orchard this week, and I managed to control myself and not visit it every day to see what it had caught.  We have dodgy photos of a fat pigeon, a rat, a hedgehog, and a possible ragondin, or coypu.  The fox was also nosing around and a blackbird did his thing in front of the camera too.  A duck walked past.  But the most prolific visitors to the area, and yet not the ones that make the paths, were the pheasants.  Here are three girls doing what they do.

The warm weather means that the male pheasants are getting frisky, so clearly my three girls are interesting prey.  There are sounds off too!

But I don't think male pheasants are that bright, and this one has also been tagged by someone, so is also at a bit of a disadvantage.  Doesn't stop him thinking he is pretty fab though!

The trail camera is on the move now, to keep an eye on what is causing damage elsewhere, and hopefully will have some good footage again for next week, when I will be back to Sunday updates.

 

 

Short, wintery days

Still no images from the trail camera, after a week at what I thought would be an interesting spot.  What I actually captured was a still and a video of a cat following my trail around the meadow, a still of a blackbird, and numerous images of my legs as I went to check the camera.  Ho hum.  It has been moved and now to see what crops up at a different site - annoyingly, after I'd moved the camera, I found evidence of something having been in the area, which I think is jolly unfair.

So back to more classic ways of capturing images - and during the week we caught first sight of the new moon over the roof of the house.  It was a classic clear, cold evening and a tiny slip of moon like a toe nail clipping!

Of course if it is like that in the evening, you wake up to a winter wonderland of ice the following day, but frost crystals on leaves do make for interesting images.

• 
• 

Cold mornings also mean that the small birds are keen on the fat balls I put out for them.  As well as remarkably critical tits of various sorts, there is a flock of sparrows that haunts the feeder.  At one stage I reckon there were a dozen on or by it, until Zola the cat trotted around the corner from annoying the chickens and they scattered.  That was also the time when I was trying to get a photo of them on and around the feeder, so typically I have a number of photos of nothing much.  But greed got the better of them and before I had put the phone away, a couple were back.  Not the best photo, but you get the idea.

We were in the One Acre Wood this morning, so I spent some time planning where the trail camera might go, looking at where the leaves have been disturbed or where there are clear trails that aren't us.  I have some ideas!  I was also able to spot the other beech trees in the parcels next to ours, as at the moment, their leaves are mightily conspicuous.

• 
• 

Checking out the Meadow, after it has had its annual mow, and looking for evidence of wildlife as a target for the trail camera, I took some time to notice the new growth coming up.  It strikes me it would be interesting to do a quadrant test to see how many species there are in half a square meter, as looking at the photo below I can make out two types of orchid, clovers, plantains, moss, grass and others that I am not familiar with.  And therein lies the problem - I am not enough of a botanist to distinguish between clover types, or different trefoils, or different plantains.  Perhaps I need to buy a student for a week!  Anyway - here is a photo - how many can you spot?

I can see at least 9 different things in there.