The precipitous mountains of the Alpi Apuane hold the rarest and most sought after seams of white marble that are mainly worked on the western facing slopes high above Carrara where the quarries leave blazing, white scars on the bare peaks. On the eastern flanks, in the villages around Casola in Lunigiana, the lower hills are covered in dense forests and a scattering of small villages with their surrounding hay meadows, vegetable plots and olive groves.

These habitats are rich in wildlife; turtle doves purr and feed on the roads and tracks and serins sing their incessant jingle; blackbirds and hoopoes forage under the olives especially where the wild boar have been rooting around. Black redstarts, nest on the wall of the barn and grey wagtails on the wall of a house above the narrow aqueduct that runs through the heart of the village. Goldfinches build their tiny nest in a small cherry tree by the house. A male redstart sings from the tree tops and there is no let up in the din from the local flock of Italian sparrows. Common and honey buzzards appear in the sky occasionally.

The meadows are full of yellow rattle, ox-eye daisy, knapweed and the brilliant blue of meadow clary; the meadow browns are everywhere along with occasional fritillaries and silver-studded blues. This year, the butterflies are less numerous perhaps because of the incessantly wet weather but the local olive grove holds Adonis blue, Duke of Burgundy and most striking of all, large chequered skipper.