C'est une chose d'observer le déclin de la nature pendant de nombreuses années, mais c'en est une autre d'être témoin de sa destruction au cours d'un après-midi.
Cette parcelle se trouve juste en amont de chez nous. Il s'agissait autrefois d'un bois, mais il a été coupé à blanc il y a quelques années. Notre maison a été inondée pour la première fois l'hiver suivant, car il n'y avait rien pour ralentir l'écoulement de l'eau dans le Bandiat. Nous avons assisté avec soulagement au rétablissement du terrain. Il est devenu plein de grenouilles, de crapauds, de salamandres de feu et a été le site de notre champignon préféré - le champignon des nids d'oiseaux. Les châtaigniers ont repoussé et des landes intéressantes sont apparues entre les deux.
Cette pelleteuse a travaillé tout l'après-midi. Et maintenant, le champ en pente raide est à nouveau dégarni. Je n'attends pas avec impatience les pluies d'hiver.
The ever amazing market at Piégut-pluviers. Get there early folks, especially in August!
#marketsoffrance #marchésdefrance #piegutpluviers
So much basil this year. So I thought I'd make some pesto. I didn't have any parmesan so it's accidently vegan! Still tastes great and apparently, the traditional pesto used to be vegan with parmesan only added recently as a cheap bulking and flavour enhancer. 😀 🌱
Quick post lunch stop at the time-wasting-bush yielded silver-washed frit, broad bordered bee hawk moth and a noisy, busy little carder bee. No wonder I never get anything done!
Back home again after a trip to the UK and out for a quick ride on Tina the mule and Balkan the strange little arab. I do think it's important to constantly grin like an idiot while riding 🤣.
Imagine waking up to birdsong....and nothing else.
This is the main bedroom of our family gite Chataignier.
Relaxing breaks in the French Limousine countryside for people who love nature.
Availability in August.
🔗 Link in bio. (What this means is click on our name and you will see the website link. Click on this and it will take you to our website).
#gitesinfrance #gitesdecharme #natureholidays
Found this guy on the dog walk, soaking up some moisture before the heat of the day.
#amphibiansofinstagram
Female toad living in a Wind in the Willows style hollowed out log. We say hello to her whenever we pass. 🐸
I think that emoji is technically a frog but you get the idea.
A guest took this amazing video of a coypu.
Coypu are special to anyone from Norfolk and Cambridgeshire as we remember the campaign waged against them between 1981 and 1986. They were trapped and shot to extinction by teams of trappers - there was a headage payment for each animal killed. Several of the people I worked with used to be trappers. It was widely regarded as one of the most successful eradication programmes for a non native species in the UK. Possibly the only ever successful attempt!
Their crime had been to damage the flood defences of the low lying area known as the fens. Some areas are below sea level. As herbivores, they can also cause significant crop damage (but I would argue not as significant as the damage that crops cause to riparian habitats). So although we've heard the folklore, most of us have never seen one.
In this part of France they are generally disliked but tolerated. And occasionally still eaten. They taste a bit like, no not chicken, but rabbit or dark turkey meat. They can transmit diseases to humans and we've noticed they have an impact on the watercrowfoot, so I don't think they're brilliant for our river Le Bandiat. However I find it hard not to be enchanted by the presence of a mammal this big, and oh, the whiskers! Also we've noticed that their burrows collapse and make interesting backwater habitat on the river banks, and since we don't need the banks to be flood defence structures this is only a good thing.
Thanks to Gareth and Nessa Dalglish for the video.
#nutria #coypu
