St Patrick’s Day In the bright afternoon, a female hen harrier flies low over the ground and always into the sun to ambush the teal and snipe near the Marsh hide. She never manages a kill but comes very close; the snipe screech and take off and the teal flock splashes into the middle of…
Tag: Hen harrier
The South Charente in Late June
Under thundery skies, the herbaceous borders at Boisjarzeau are at their colourful best. The wet spring this year has saved on the watering but the garden meadows are unusually thick with false oat-grass and barren brome with little space for wildflowers. A sward full of yellow rattle would impede the grasses and promote floral diversity…
Llyn Brenig and Llyn Bugeilyn
7th and 8th July 2018 On the way to the Elenydd mountains to check a merlin’s nest on the edge of a forest of Sitka spruce that has sadly failed, we stop at a small village hall to try to catch breeding swifts. There are perhaps 10-15 pairs and they come and go flying in…
Summer days at Boisjarzeau
The heat of the past few days brings dark thunderstorms that travel up from the south over the wooded hills to the west, then switch direction, run up the Vallée de la Tude, and deluge the ground. The humidity immediately drops and the cool, clear air is cleaned of pollen and dust. The fields of cereals and young…
Moulin de Perdrigeau
April 5th and 6th 2016 The old windmill with no sails sits on the hilltop in the centre of the forest like an upturned flower pot; the top is now a watch tower wth 360 degree views over the pines and farmland, with distant wooded hills, villages and La Vallée de la Tude that runs north to south away to…
South Charente Spring
The fine chateau at Villebois-Lavalette sits on a low hill, the medieval fortifications speak of a long and combustible history: an Iron Age fortification; a Roman castrum; an English stronghold during the Hundred Years War; the seat of Dukes in the age of aristocracy; a prison after the Revolution; and today a battleground for summer tourists. The land hereabouts is…