The Wonder of Nature

Being in France one got used to all sorts of creatures running around in the garden (and the house of some occasions) from very large Toads to Lizards and Snakes plus the occasional Wild Boar and Bull (from the next field, who liked grazing in our orchard rather than their own field). I have some wonderful stories about one particular Bull which I named Daisy (I know the name doesnt suit) I'll cover this soon.

Nothing, but nothing beats looking out into our garden here and watching the birds, we have set up quite a few different feeding stations containing fat balls, seed, peanuts, etc and to watch the tiny sparrows and tits leave the hedge and flit onto the nuts, the slightest movement and they disappear back into the privet hedge again, after a few seconds, out pops all these tiny heads, glancing in every direction until they think its safe again to fly out. Its a complete joy to watch them and always brings a smile to my face. Hopefully once we have been here longer they will accept us and not be so cautious. We have noticed our Robins have been not so quick to fly away at the slightest movement.

Of course I haven’t mentioned our Cats and Dog that travelled to France with us and back again, at a total cost for the return trip only of over a thousand pounds, but I shall cover that topic soon – however, I need a very good day to mention such sad events.

Just a quiet day

Since my mentioning yesterday about the African Hoopoe in our garden, we saw three together this morning pecking with their long beaks. So managed to capture all three of them with my camera, can you spot them? They seem to like the insects in the newly cut lawn. We have been working on the garden the last couple of days as good weather has finally arrived again so perhaps this has encouraged them to stay.

This morning however, we both woke up with backaches, due to the long afternoon of weeding yesterday, so we will not be doing much out there today. It may be a good time to sit and watch the world go by for the afternoon.

We always thought when we got to France we would be sitting out in the garden with a glass of French wine in the afternoon, soaking up the sun, but I don’t think alcohol in the afternoon has ever passed our lips.

Easter weekend without the family around, doesn’t seem to mean much to us here in France, its times like this that we miss England and the family. What with the house market being very quiet due to the elections here, we think it will be quite a time before we can return to England. However, we are trying to make the most of the space here, as once we do return we will not have such a large garden with these outstanding views of the countryside.

The other thing I am sure we will miss are all the animals around us, the field at the back has all the cows in, all tagged in their ears ready for the market. The retired farmer opposite has all the Sheep, and the Chickens, although we have noticed the Cockerel never crows early in the morning, only early evening do we ever hear him and it never bothers us.

African Hoopoe

We woke this morning with the sun shining bright, although it’s still quite cold here. Spotted an unusual bird on the lawn so reached for my camera and through the window managed to get a photograph, its not a very good one, but shows some of the detail of this beautiful creature.

Apparently its an African Hoopoe (Upupa Africana) which I presume most Europeans know, however, never ever have we seen one in England so feel sure they haven’t crossed the channel. I would be interested in hearing from anyone who knows different.

We do not generally encourage birds into the garden due to having the four cats which are often on the prowl, but that doesn’t seem to deter the birds from visiting us, and some are so unusual and different. I will, in the future have to take more of an active interest in capturing these on my camera as there are so many we do not recognise, and they are so attractive.