Wildlife in't mill

Wednesday 4^th July, 2018

The thunderstorm should have left the air fresher, but it didn’t. Next day the heat was back, as hot as ever and has continued ever since. By Monday night I was so tired I went to bed in the afternoon and had a real siesta. Slept for an hour, and then slept all night too. Days later we are still hot, hot, hot and getting very little done. We are drinking litres of water and skulking in the shade wherever we can find it.

Saw a fox the other night, running away from me across the nearest part of the cows’ field. It had been foraging among the irises that grow by the stream, but ran off into the woods. Tim never saw it, but he finds the little piles of poo filled with cherry stones or some dark blue fruit. I scooped a frog from the pool with the long net and dumped it in the wild grass. Currently watching a chick being reared in the rafters of the bolly. We think they are swifts or swallows (we don’t know the difference!) and then there is the large grasshopper that dh picked up somewhere on his way back from shopping in Vergt. It was clinging to the front bumper and seemed unhurt, so we released it into the nearby honeysuckle. Small adventures, all of them, but part of the rural life we like. Oh, and there was the mouse who came galloping in from the hayfields when the farmer was cutting the hay and the kites were flying overhead; it made a beeline for the house door until dh put his foot in the way. Mouse turned sharp right and ran along the house wall back to the fields – but our fields and woods, hopefully.

I also forgot to mention the unmentionables - those pesky biting flies that find every inch of unprotected flesh and leave an itchy red bump that makes us look like plague victims!

Strange creatures

Saturday 8^th July

Quite busy editing – a good chunk done, and an emotional one, not easy to do in case the whole thing is ruined. But I think it is tighter now and better for it. I’ve deleted upwards of 40k words, so if I feel the story needs a little more exposition or internal dialogue, I add that. We’re hovering at 103k words now for the whole thing, which is about where I want to be.

It’s been a cloudy morning, and I walked Tim on the road, on a lead, up the hill towards Monsieur Lambert’s farm. The farmers have suddenly sprung into life around us and they’re nipping about with small tractors spiking a couple of hay bales from the field and chugging off down the road with  the bales held before them. When the sun is out and its over 34 degrees, the whole valley is silent and still.

I’ve been curious about something that wanders about the area. Animal, since it moves. Strong enough to dig a hole about the size of a tin of Heinz baked beans in the hay field and then crap in it. Perfect aim. Dark coloured, with lots of cherry stones. I recognise deer poo when I see it, but deer don’t dig holes and anyway it’s a different shape and consistency. I found another hole, near the little stone bridge, as I walked up to the farm this morning, Fresher, with no cherry stones. 

So I came home and googled for info, not really expecting anything to come up in answer to “animal that digs holes to defecate” but right away the answer came back: a badger. I’m relieved. I had been worried it might be wild boar and I didn’t want Tim (or me) to suddenly come face to face with one of them. Surrounded as we are by miles of woodland, they are bound to be nearby, but I’ve never seen one. The hunters go out after them in the autumn/winter season. There are tales galore about more hunters being wounded by gunshot than boar being killed, but I don’t know how true they are.

Night activity

the bolly

Another day with 36 degrees forecast. We are longing for rain! Or at least cooler days, some cloud, some wind. We’re not eating much in the way of dinners, but Magnums from the freezer are most welcome mid-afternoon. That’s when I swim. 

Yesterday the tiles around the pool were too hot to walk on, so it was a mad dash out of the shade of the bolly to the edge of the pool! If this weather continues, and it is forecast at over 30 until next Monday, I shall be an accomplished swimmer before we go home.

The late evenings are very pleasant. We switch between the bolly and the balcony in the hope of catching a breeze. The farmer turned up at 10pm last night, headlights on his tractor and we thought he must be about to move his hay bales. He did the turning and baling after eight o'clock at night earlier this week and finished with two tractors whirling around in the dark with headlights glaring. Rather like watching huge fireflies flitting about. If he did, he took only one (we couldn’t actually see what he was doing because of the rather large and healthy pine tree) before he roared off back up the hill to the north. Next morning the bales were still in the field.

Two mornings ago I saw a young fox racing away from us as Tim and I returned to the house, and yesterday evening it was a small deer that legged it at the first sight of us as we left the house. Tim saw neither – some dog he! I’m pleased, actually, because if he had seen it, he’d have chased it. He nearly broke his lead this morning to attack something (unseen) in the hedge at the end of the drive. Naturally, I saw nothing, and he never caught anything. Maybe it was the scent of the deer. Or the fox.

I’ve finished reading a Jack Reacher I brought with me – Without Fail. Interesting story but a tad long-winded on the explanations, but isn't that typical Lee Child? It struck me yesterday that he's becoming more like Sherlock Holmes in the way he makes his deductions about what villains will do or why they do it. Intriguing to read, but must be annoying to have someone like that in real life! I found one of his titles  I hadn't read - Night School - on the shelves here, so I'm reading that now.

Noises in the morning

We’ve been relaxing and not doing much work the last few days. The little black flies have been horrendous this year, possibly because it is so damp. Lots of rain earlier in the year, but the stream is back to its normal levels now, so Tim is much happier. He didn’t like it when it was so deep. At one point I realised I was wearing long trousers and long sleeves – and still getting bitten! I asked myself why did I come to France? 

Today however, I’m hopeful the worst is over, for the air is much drier and the flies are much fewer. I’m still wearing long trousers, but it is not a conscious decision. Just a left over from a seven o’ clock walk in the dew-wet fields with Tim. We got barked at by something we never saw, lurking in the bushes, and Tim was nervous. I can only assume it was the big dog-fox dh saw when we first arrived. 

So far I haven’t seen any wildlife at all – things just keep making noises in the undergrowth. One morning last week something was hissing and spitting at me and Tim ran ten feet away. That wasn’t a fox, but it might have been a coypou, or an otter? It was on the river bank, in dense undergrowth. I saw grass moving as it vanished, but that was all.

We had a brief spell without the swimming pool. We knew it needed a new part, but were not prepared for the electrician to switch the punp off when he came on Monday. Without the pump the water doesn’t move, flies dive bomb it and little bodies, leaves and stuff floats around on the surface. We had our doubts about the electrician ever returning, but he did today, and with the new part which he fitted and voila! We have a functioning pool once more. I shall have a dip around four this afternoon when it is hot and the water has warmed up in the sunshine. 

Time flies

Here we are at Sunday again, our third here and it hardly feels like that at all. You may find it hard to believe but I was up and out with the dog by half past six in the morning yesterday; also today, but today I cheated and we both came back to our respective beds after he had relieved himself. Twenty minutes past eight we finally decided it was time to rise and shine. Consequently it is ten past eleven by the time I sit down at my computer. Time flies! 


The mousetrap went off with a clatter while we watched tennis yesterday. So that's mouse number two sent on its way. A third one has nicked the dog biscuit without setting off the trap, so no doubt this war will go on for some time.

The forecast was for overcast and cloudy today, so we had planned to drive down to Bergerac. But the sun is shining and it is very warm, so we are still at the mill. Tomorrow the forecast is for rain, so we will see. Maybe tomorrow it will be Bergerac.

Meanwhile, we'll keep watching the wildlife around us. Dragon flies are hatching on the pond, hanging over the  water in jewelled clusters. Tiny frogs abound, literally, in the grass and reeds. DH says he is constantly seeing them leap out of the way of the tractor when he cuts the grass. The little one on the right is hovering on the top of the water, with his shadow on the stone beneath and he has adopted excellent camouflage. He looks exactly like the stone beneath him.  If I hadn't seen him jump, I'd never have spotted him. (Sorry, no pun intended.)

The squirrel has made two appearances, both times galloping over the house roof and then down to the bolly rails. Our wildlife camera has recorded two white eyes in the darkness, presumably Monsieur Reynard doing his rounds. No more sightings of the coypu, though something is leaving tracks into and out of the pond. There are definite trails now. Mallards, perhaps as we often see them fly off in the early morning, and Tim has routed them out from the river.

Mud and frogs

The first casualty discovered yesterday. A large lizard - well, about twelve inches long had his tail had been intact - was discovered in the filter of the swimming pool. The poor thing must have got in when the pool was being built and then found himself trapped. I have no idea how long ago that was, but certainly some months. On a happier note, dh rescued a small lizard - about three inches this time - flopping about in the pool itself. Maybe they can swim, but I doubt it would have got out unaided even if it found the steps. These swimming pools are lethal to wildlife.
David and Jenny talked of a pond they'd excavated, and I imagined something about fifteen feet across. I ought to have known better.  The pond is something like 200 yards long and  thirty yards across. Already frogs are populating it. We thought the croaking came from ducks, since there are plump mallards around, but were told this morning it is the bullfrogs making such a to-do. A man with a digger is supposed to arrive today to level out the "spoil heaps" of excavated soil and rock and insert a land drain from the spring to the pond, so the frogs had better watch out. On the other hand, he was supposed to arrive on 15th May, so we'll not hold our breath. The spring is draining naturally, as it has for years, and causing a wetland area which Tim discovered with great glee. He romps through the mud and green slime and splatters frogs in every direction. I ought to take a photo of this black dog who tries to leap on us until we get out the hose pipe and hose him down to find the white dog underneath. A man further up the valley captured a thousand frogs - don't ask me how - from his pond, and sold them to restaurants. It seems even frogs can be a cash crop.
I'm happy to say Mr Greener is back. He's been missing for a year or two. Mr Greener is a chaffinch (I think) and he has a distinctive line in song, which repeats over and over. The last line always ends in the phrase "it's greener." I know, its stupid of me, but I'm glad he's back.

House of Wine and wildlife

We must have missed the House of Wine in Bergerac on other trips, or else it has opened up this year. We didn't bother going down into the caves or view the art exhibition. The courtyard was more than enough for me, with its wooden gallery on two sides and old, ivy-covered stone and brick walls completing the square. Beneath the gallery a series of posters details the history of wine in the area from Stone Age times, with lots of info on which wines grew where and why. Philistine that I am, I just like drinking it!

Still the rain continues. It's like being at home, except that it's still warmer here most of the time. The clouds are hanging low over the tree tops and the air is thick and heavy - 94% humidity. We may have to go looking for a lavarie soon - we can wash clothes at the mill no problem, but drying them in this weather is an issue.

There is a field surrounded by trees next to the mill, and we've found that deer come down at night and eat the plums off the tree. They regularly trek through in both directions, going down to drink at the river, or just passing through. We've put up our wildlife camera overnight, and caught one picture where the deer certainly saw or heard something from the camera as it took his picture. He stared right at it, and then vanished into the darkness. The camera caught a few other pictures, sometimes a stag, sometimes a doe. We saw a doe while we were eating breakfast on the bolly one morning, and yesterday around sixish, still daylight, I looked up just at the right moment to see a doe and faun sprinting for the cover of the trees.