Happy New Year to all my friends and family! Thanks for following and supporting my blog, despite the lack of posts of late. How was your Christmas? Ours was just us two as usual but this year, after all these years in France, we went 'French' and had a shellfish blowout on Christmas Eve just like the French do. No oysters or yucky whelks for us; we ordered only the things we like - prawns, langoustines and crab claws. I've thought about doing this many times before but always imagined the supermarket on Xmas Eve would be a nightmare, but in fact going at lunchtime to collect our order it was just as empty as it usually is! So we'll be eating a la francaise again in the future.
For Christmas Day lunch, we again forewent the traditional turkey and had roast beef and yorkshire pud, followed by mincemeat bakewell tart. I made this tart three years ago and it was a hit - sorry about my rubbish food photography skills but here's the recipe and a better picture. If you like mincemeat it's really yummy and worth the hassle of making the sweet pastry - but there is no blind baking involved so not as hard as you'd think.
I did make mince pies but this year was a first - I made Mary Berry's pastry which is slightly sweet and has orange zest in it. It made a nice change.
What do you buy the woman who has everything? Some books about butterflies and moths of course, and a butterfly tea light holder. :-)
Right, onto the subject matter of the title. We actually took Mary Moho out three times in December! to the same place on the coast each time, although the photos here are from the first and most recent trips because the second time it decided to cloud over and rain. Yes rain, how very dare it! We set out in sunshine! So no walking that day.
We 'discovered' a new place; well we knew it existed from having looked at google earth, but hadn't explored around there yet. Not everywhere is easy to access or park in a moho, but luck was on our side as we stumbled upon a real moho car park at Pointe du Meinga, which is halfway between St Malo and Cancale. There is a coastal footpath all the way around the headland (it's the GR34) and a farm track up the middle, as some of the land is used to grow vegetables. For us seeing fields of cauliflowers and leeks is quite a change! Each walk (coastal track one way then back via the farm track) took about 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours, so is a good work out, as the coastal track is very up and down and has some difficult rocky places here and there. I needed Keith's help in some places and the second time took an alpine stick, which was useful in the difficult places.
Here are pics from the first day we went there, and the beach is the one on the west of the headland. Either side of the headland has fabulous golden sandy beaches - wonderfully empty in winter of course!
Selfie time - who needs special effects - those rays are for real from the sun (pure luck rather than photography skills!).
This rock caught my eye - what kind of face do you see? I see a sleeping koala, or a squirrel with its hand stuck out.... people on facebook and instagram saw all sorts of things, parrot being quite popular.
The most recent trip was the Friday before New Year, when it was even more cold and frosty than the first time. Inland was rather foggy and frozen but it was a glorious day at the coast. This time we were able to park in a car only car park with sea view, as the height barrier had been lifted. The following photo is our view from the moho whilst having lunch. Not bad, especially when you are sitting in comfort in the warmth, eating a hot picnic (Nigel Slater's chorizo soup/stew with crusty bread).
A view from the farm track...
...and the beach taken a bit closer from the coastal footpath. That white line is frost!
Steps leading down to the beach and a view back over the headland.
Back home the frost had not melted at all and the next day was even more frosty! I haven't seen frost quite like it here before, and to linger all day long is very unusual. This is chicken wire and that's Blondie the hen in the background.
We had to take Mary Moho back to where she lives, and K had heard that there was snow along the way and cars had gone off the road into the ditch. Thankfully by the time we got there the snow had melted on the road but the whiteness of the harsh frost was even more magical as it was covered in a smattering of snow. It's very weird how you can have such microclimates as this patch had freezing fog which we drove through the day before on the way to the lockup. Here at the lockup it was back to just the normal white frost - still incredibly magical. This is the only photo I have of any kind of view, through the moho window of the barrier gate at the lockup!
Icy weather means a frozen lake, and our ducks managed to get iced into a small patch of water beside the fallen tree, which was out in the middle of the (thankfully) narrower end of the lake. Of course I had a bit of a wade into the water and bashed at the ice with my wellies, but that was fairly pointless and all I got was wet jeans as my wellies are not waterproof anymore. So poor K had to get his waders on and get out in the water with a long pole to break the ice, so that the ducks could come and get some food on the bank.
Can you guess what happened the next day? Yes the silly ducks were iced in again, cue K getting his waders on again. I'm glad to say some of the water melted a few days ago and even though it is icy again, this time the ducks are up the far end under the overhanging trees by the bank, in a sensible place where I can take them food!
We also had our tree guy in to fell some trees but I have quite a lot of photos so that'll be another post. All these photos are taken on my phone - I've barely used a camera since coming back from holiday!
I am back from a week spent with my Mum in not so sunny Somerset, one of the reasons I've been quiet since my last post. More about that further on because I want to show pics I've taken throughout the month in some vague order. I have only taken photos on my phone as I wasn't really in the mood for shooting anything much in my garden for the gazillionth time, so these are just a few things that I found or that happened along the way.
Andrea the hen 'helping' after I'd just weeded the tubs. I am down to only two hens now as the one who had scaly leg mite died, poor thing. I'm not replacing them and guess what, we just had to BUY some eggs!!! Both hens are now in full moult so have stopped laying.
And here she is pecking at maggots from the bag of bird peanuts that we found wriggling. It really annoys me when that happens as they are really expensive to buy and aren't always available, hence us usually buying several bags at a time. The hens weren't interested in eating the peanuts though, but luckily (or not) we had a nighttime visitor a few nights ago who came and scoffed them up. K spotted a fox one night just after he'd put the outside light on looking for Harry who hadn't come in. He thought it was Harry for a moment until he realised Harry didn't have such big ears and a pointy face. I'm wary about a fox getting into the garden and fear for the cats as well as the ducks, but as it happened dear Harry was safe as he'd got himself locked in the barn for the night! It was pretty cool seeing the fox though.
I spotted this Small Heath butterfly roosting on the Golden Rod at about 5pm one evening, long before we changed the clocks.
I also found this huge Fox Moth caterpillar. You can see from the photo with my hand just how big it is.
And now, something very interesting - another thing that's both exciting to see but also makes me wary about such a thing getting into the garden. This is up the far end of the pond where the stream comes in and the shallowest area of lake, so it dries up when the pond level is very low (it's down about 4 foot or more right now). Well now, what might have caused this? There was a trail of deep footprints and a big area that had been wallowed in. We conclude it must have been a wild boar, because the footprints are cloven and have sunk in very deeply compared to the other pawprints around it.
It might be best if you click on this photo to view it larger, as you can see coarse hair marks in the mud, just like a wild boar had been lying against it.
Again, if you look closer at the next photo you can see pawprints which at the time I thought either dog or fox, and now that we know that a fox got in, I'm guessing they must be fox tracks. The wild boar's tracks are much deeper.
We realised that we never repaired a hole in the fence where the fence crosses the stream, so that has now been rectified (although the fox was spotted after that was done, so must be getting in through one of the holes where the cats get out. We can't repair every bit of damaged fence wire under the hedge.)
Our 'tree man' has just been to give a quote for felling more overcrowded trees and thinks he may be able to remove the stand of alders that fell over into the pond earlier in the year. Part of it is still in water, the rest in mud too squidgy to walk on and I have no idea how deep that mud is as I don't want to lose my wellies! I guess planks to stand on is the way to go.
Piccy of the cats, though no Hallie. The lawn is how we found it when we came back from hols after it had finally rained - very blotchy. We're still awaiting the autumn rains.
Back to England, I had a lovely time, a lot of it spent eating all my favourite things! I love clotted cream and having a cream tea was so good I had to take a photo of it. K stayed at home looking after the menagerie and I flew over and my brother picked me up from Southampton airport. Sadly Flybe only use the Exeter route for a few months in the summer now and in fact there are no flights to Southampton during winter anymore. I came home on the last flight of the year. Both flights were full by the way. Conclude from that what you will.
It was gloomy most days but I did a bit of gardening for Mum and got out for a nice long walk with the husband of a friend of my Mum with his dog, which was great as it was a round trip walk that otherwise I would never have known existed. We saw dozens of pheasants. Here is a pic from the top of Mum's garden with the neighbour's Sumac tree looking really colourful.
On the way home I had a good view and the sun came out as soon as we hit France (of course!) so I took a load of photos as we were coming in to land. Love these old prop planes!
And then it was back to collecting yet more walnuts to add to the pile, and yet more huge windfall apples. I intend to stew up a load of apples and freeze them as apple sauce.
I did take a few photos of the garden with my phone. My Forest Pansy has been looking great all October, but we just had a proper white frost the other day so tons of leaves have dropped off the trees now.
And here's the pond showing how low it is, with the fallen tree just visible at the far end.
I've not been terribly in the mood for blogging - think I'm suffering from blog writer's block. It doesn't help that the depression is lurking now the gloomy weather is back, although it's mostly kept at bay by my medication. So if my posts are sporadic then that will be why. I have recently had a CT scan for my twice annual check up and everything was fine, so that's one year clear of cancer now! And I don't have a hernia which I thought I had. I do have a bulge which is why I thought I had one, but the scan just shows fat..... :-)
We are just back from a MoHo trip and about to go off on another one, so really making the most of this wonderfully dismal weather! This June was certainly not flaming, more like a damp squib. On the plus side, no watering of the garden and the grass is still nice and green.
Summing up June when we were at home - newly fledged birds figured high this month. Something I noticed in May, which was confirmed by a snippet I heard on Springwatch on the TV about the failure of caterpillars this year, something that happens about once every 12 years. I'd thought that there must have been a lack of the usual little green caterpillars that the Tits (particularly Blue Tits) feed to their young. Now, normally there is a period where the Tits seem to disappear, and hardly any birds visit the feeders. One fatball can last a week or more. This is during the period of the caterpillar and the raising of the young. But this year that quiet period never happened and we have been feeding the birds left right and centre these last two months. During June all the parents showed their newly fledged kids where the free meals were, and we have been going through fatballs and peanuts ever since at a rate of knots. This too is unusual as usually the newly fledged birds leave the feeders after a few days of getting acquainted with the free meals, presumably preferring to eat more natural food elsewhere. So all the more reason to feed our garden birds all year round.
A young Blue Tit, just fledged, sits on the windowsill wondering where to go next.
"It looks nice in there".
I saved this just fledged wren from Hallie - it was an amazing sight as suddenly two little birds flew low over the veg patch and Hallie leapt into the air and caught this bird! Thank god I was there and was able to get it from her unharmed. I put the little bird in the hedge at the bottom of the garden (there were cats everywhere and no good vegetation around where I found it). I then felt guilty as Mama Wren was calling for her babies and I'd put it in a different place. Well, what can you do?!
Mama Wren calling (damn that fence wire!).
The home made feeder is looking a bit the worse for wear now - sometimes it has about 10 juvenile Tits on it, not to mention baby Great Spotted Woodpecker who visits often, plus other adult birds.
Another young Blue Tit.
And in other news - what's this hideous photo for? Well I had a tooth out. I really didn't think I'd be posting this in public but I am!! And why am I wearing a fur stole? Well it's Bertie and me trying to take selfies together. :-) OK forget the smiley face, I am in the early stages of having a bridge done involving four teeth (one now out) and two root canals..... ugh. :-( It really doesn't help that I can only understand about 30% of what my dentist says, so I have no idea why I need root canals. She's the only French person who I've ever come across who doesn't understand anything I say either!! I just have to hope for the best here.
I found a Bee Beetle (Trichius fasciatus)! I don't see these guys very often and they are so funky.
This Cinnabar moth (Tyria jacobaeae) was in the chicken shed - I thought it was dead as it was lying on the ground unmoving and then did a good impression of being dead on my hand too. Luckily for it, it started to move so I put it on this Clematis, 'The President", and it came back to life.
June marked the return of the blue damselflies, several species being spotted, though I've only seen one dragonfly here flying around the pond, and only on a few sunny warm days.
Blue-tailed Damselfly (Ischnura elegans)
Butterflies have been very thin on the ground, with a few brave Painted Ladies and the return of our stalwarts, the Meadow Brown, usually flying low over the lawn.
Plants are loving the damper conditions and the veg patch continues to look stunning (so long as you don't look closer at the more weedy wildflowers!). This is mid month when the Opium poppies were in full bloom and the foxgloves too. Now it's more great spires of Verbascum and Verbena bonariensis giving height. This photo is probably best clicked on to view full screen.
I left a couple of parsnips in to flower as I hadn't ever seen their blooms - I remembered that they were yellow as some years back Cleve West used them in a Chelsea design. Actually they are more stunning than I thought - quite similar to dill but a lot more chunky. Insects like them too.
Phone photo of some bugs on the parsnip flowers: Crab Spider, Red Soldier Beetle and Thick Thighed Flower Beetle.
I also left some carrots in the ground and they are flowering too - really I shouldn't be surprised that cultivated carrots look very much like..... wild carrot flowers! I found a crab spider on one of them too.
Over the garden gate - Opium poppies and our native red poppy. A lot of the white flowers here are coriander gone to seed.
Opium poppies up close - they are very photogenic.
New Heuchera bed after a weed. The little fence is working for keeping the chickens off!
Sheltering from the rain in the potting shed.
Towards the end of the month we discovered this Alder tree fallen in the lake. There is a stand of them two-thirds of the way up the pond and one of them's roots interspersed with soil stuck out into the pond a little way, like a little island. Over the years though when the water level has gone down, the tree's rootball has been tunnelled under by muskrats and probably coypu, leaving it weakened, and we have been waiting for this to happen. One smaller tree fell a few years ago, but this one has taken the rootball with it and none of it is exactly accessible. I'm not sure what will happen with this tree, but for now there's a nice Kingfisher perch which I hope will be used.
One last picture - I've had the moth trap out a few times and whilst I haven't had as much variety as I had expected for this time of year, I did bag a beautiful Elephant Hawkmoth one night.
Let's hope for some warmer weather in July, and a few more butterflies!
