Pixietoadstool

Hi there! Yes it's a good idea to protect them from frost if they are in pots but fig trees are usually quite hardy when they are in the soil.  The fig fruits twice a year in warmer climes but in France you would only get the second fruiting on the figs which appear from Spring onwards, so you might be alright.  Fruit ripens from August onwards, depending on the variety and conditions. If the tree is still alive you would expect to see some signs of life like green buds - even ours in the UK is starting to bud after this cold spell.  If there are no obvious signs of life now, sadly, it is probably no longer with us. Valerie

Sounds about right to me if they haven't got owner's club membership.  We are travelling out from Portsmouth to Caen on Thursday for 18 days and ended up paying about £200 to BF with our discount which would make the full price about £270 (we go on the cheaper crossings which are out p.m. back a.m.). Valerie

I was actually taught to do this by an employee of Thames Water who was trying to find the water supply at the front of our property - he even let me keep his rods (which you can buy on-line from Hawkins Bazaar by the way).  Clair is right in that the rods/coat hanger detect a change in the underlying material - we also identified a buried car and a buried hot water boiler in our drive using the rods!!  When they cross it means that the substrate or whatever has changed - could be water - could be something else. When we bought our French house the notaire made it a condition of the purchase that we have mains water installed - she said it was a government ruling that all house were being brought onto mains water.  So we don't have access to the spring anymore since it is on our neighbour's land.  I suppose we could dig another one though.  However, there's not much shortage of water in Normandie d'habitude!! Valerie

[quote user="Millymollymandy"]My best discovery is that my favourite bird, the Crested Tit, can be seen in Brittany. I was used to these pesky little birds all over my garden in Eastern France. To my delight I have now seen several in my garden. [:)][/quote] I saw some crested tits in our garden in Normandie (Basse) and thought "What are those funny t*&s with odd heads?" and seeing the word "huppe" in my book I realised and thought "I've never seen those before".  I have since discovered that in the UK these birds are only seen in the Caledonian pine forests of Northern Scotland.  Yet another species we don't have in normal situations in the UK. I have several exciting wildlife discoveries in terms of my experience in France: A goshawk calling in our deciduous wood next to the house (only identified when I played the calls on a BIRDs DVD software programme on my computer - a spine chilling call) A fire salamander in our friend's stopcock chamber A red squirrel in our hazel trees (thought it was an autumnally coloured chestnut leaf at first) Over 30 goldfish that must have arrived with some weeds that we didn't realise were there until 6 months later when my son proclaimed we have some fish in our pond Probably a fouine only identified by the very definite ferret smell coming from our loft chamber plus lots of noise in the night as it ran around probably courting a mate The terrifying call of a couple or three barn owls waking me in the night - I thought I was being attacked by a horde of evil spirits Valerie    

Hi there! It would be Marcel Pagnol for me - after reading his books my French learning accelerated enormously.  He wrote Jean de Florette, Manon des Sources, La Gloire de mon Pere and Le Chateau de ma Mere.  The last two I have seen in a pocket book (i.e. French student edition) and they were very easy to read that way.  With the other two books I read the whole unadulterated story and thoroughly enjoyed them. Hope this helps? Valerie

Chris, Just about this time of year and a little later in the UK I usually see three buzzards flying together often climbing very high and performing lots of clever acrobatics with mid-air jousts (as many as 8 doing this together last year).  My brother said that the 3 were probably a couple with last year's child - is this likely or would it be 2 males courting just the one female (or more - in the case of the 8)? Valerie  

Dandelions are called piss en lits because they actually do have a diuretic action (i.e. make you pass water) - there you go!  ... but I think you have to EAT them first! By the way - I was told the same story by my granny - from North Yorkshire. Valerie

"I wondered whether it might be to do with greater affluence - vegetables being very much the everyday food of the poor" King Henry VIII may have died from scurvy (or possibly syphilis or both) - anyhow he was pretty unhealthy because he viewed vegetables as food for the poor - hence his cook served him mostly meat.  

My main complaint about the book is his writing style:  it seems more a list of notes rather than writing prose which I find difficult to follow.  Also, some of his sentences either don't make any sense or are so obtuse that I can't be bothered to spend any more time working out what he actually meant to say.  I think this is a shame as it seems like he has some very good material to include in the book plus an interesting anecdotal ability (but not quite to the extent of George East - love him or hate him - I personally love him!). There you are - I am trying to read Narrow Dog at the moment but not sure whether I have the stamina to get to the end!! Valerie    

Hi Catalpa!!, Having just returned from Quillan, I can confirm that it is the "dog shite" capital of France - so much so that a local inhabitant has set up a campaign to draw people's attention to the problem with some very interesting and varied photographs in his shop window.  In fact I find it difficult to report on the state of Quillan these days as my eyes were permanently focused on "merde spotting"!  My son managed to tread in some twice - which I had the great pleasure of having to scrape off with a stick etc., and it was most unpleasant.  However (as you know Catalpa) at our house in the Normandie countryside I seem to have double standards and allow my dog to crap wholeheartedly on the verges - but if on the road I move it off.  I suppose it is mainly a question of amount and the problems it causes.  In Normandie there is also plenty of fox, sanglier, cow, pig and undiagnosed (possibly badger or stone marten) crap to avoid on our travels and so I reason a little more dog shite won't make much difference.  On the pavement in the middle of the town I would have no qualms about picking up the "crottes" in a bag and taking them home.  Isn't it just that we all hate treading in it - me as much as the next personne? What do you think "Quillan"? Valerie

I brought up the subject of eagle owls a little while ago - how they seem to be moving west etc - here is the thread starter FYI.   There were several other comments. http://www.completefrance.com/cs/forums/589734/ShowPost.aspx Valerie  

Thankyou Thumper and Tourangelle - I have cut and pasted your words of wisdom and am creating a very useful guide for my trip next week! Merci bien!  

Well I like wines made with the sauvignon or chenin blanc or chardonnay grapes and so I do like Loire wines but so often they taste a bit corked or just too acidic or plain boring with no nose at all.  In the old days I enjoyed a nice Pouilly fume in restaurants (when we went out to dinner in UK) - I also have enjoyed some nice Vouvrays (and some horrid ones) and some drinkable Sancerres.  Chablis can be absolutely disgusting or delightful but often a bit too dry and uninteresting for my palate. Well there you go then!  What do you like to drink? Valerie

Dear Tourangelle, You have given me loads of information and help - thank you so much! I particularly like your suggestion to go by bus to the white wine chateaux since I will be drinking there and then I can drive my friend who drinks the red to the red wine places (we are going in my car).  I have cut and pasted your advice and will now do some more research.  Another good idea about Tours is that we would be within staggering distance (:D) of our beds!!!  I expect we will have some kind of silly adventure - we normally do! My main concern is going to a place for degustation and not liking anything and so going away without buying - embarrassed English person!!  Could you suggest decent producers of white wine in particular (I think it is easier to produce a drinkable red than a drinkable white - I must have poured gallons of French white wine down the drain bought in French supermarkets for maybe £3 but which was undrinkable!!). Thanks again! Valerie

Does anyone have any suggestions about towns/chateaux to visit in the Loire and convenient towns in the area for degustations and cheapish hotels.  I can go on the Logis de France website to locate hotels if anyone has any particular ideas. My old schoolfriend (well not that old - she is younger than me!) and I are going to our house in Normandy for a week soon but I thought it would be a nice treat to do the wine thing - but I have never done it.  What do you do?  Does one just knock on a door and ask politely if you can try their wines - and can you expect to buy anything half decent at these places for say £3 a bottle (obviously I understand you need to buy by the case). Another thing is that my friend is a red wine fanatic and I prefer white - are we likely to find wine producers close to each other that sell both/either/or red and white wines?  I am sorry to be so ignorant of the whole viniculture thing!! Any advice will be MOST welcome (including anything I haven't yet considered which I need to). Thanks! Valerie

My husband was given a card by an English electrician in Vire.  The card says he is fully French registered and has a siret number.  His details are as follows: Rod Reeves at 06 26 9568 21 (mobile) or 02 31 68 47 64 (landline) Siret number: 481774700017 Hope this helps? Valerie

We were on the Normandie - 10 a.m. out of Cherbourg on Monday - 2200 passengers and 600 cars apparently.  Thank goodness we booked early enough to get our free 4 berth cabin (owners' club) - all the seats were taken but thank God for my mother in law who got us onto the boat earlier than usual since she is slightly disabled and needed to be near a lift.  We went straight to the main restaurant and had excellent service - unlike the enormous queue of people who came after us who couldn't even be sat down at the vacant tables  for some strange BF reason - maybe they were worried they couldn't replenish the buffet quick enough. However, I think this ship was adequately staffed - I have never had to wait such a short time at the snack bar on the 9th deck and there was a great deal of choice still available even just before we docked.  We got off quickly too - helped by the large numbers of immigration officers at Portsmouth - we moved more quickly through the last bit than ever before!! I think we were exceptionally lucky.  What surprises me is how busy it was - we always come back at the last possible moment after Christmas and have never seen such conditions before - our sixth trip back at New Year. Valerie

The Guy Degrenne factory outlet is in Vire - in the industrial/retail park not far from Aldi's and But.  This is on the north eastern side of Vire, just off the main road from Vire to Caen (but before you get to LeRoy or LeClercJardi).  Right next door to Guy Degrenne is another great shop (not La Maison but something like it) and it has some very good buys for the home: kitchenalia etc. Hope this helps? Valerie  

Our village - Saint Michel de Montjoie - the granite village (with the Musee de Granit) is having its annual fireworks display   on the evening of 30th December.  Although there are only about 400 habitants, the display is so good that it usually draws thousands of spectators. There are a couple of little old houses with granite fireplaces that are transformed into les petites buvettes (drinking houses) for the evening which sell various buvettes including mulled wine.  The fireworks are fantabulous - and are set off to music.  No charge either - paid for by the social committee from creamed off profit of other get togethers during the year. St Michel de Monjoie is near St. Pois in Manche - but not that far for you to come! Valerie

You can get paracetamol over the counter and their version of co-codamol is called codoliprane - it seems stronger than our co-codamol - think it might have more codeine to paracetamol ratio per pill.  Anyhow, one is more than enough for me - if I take two I feel giddy, drugged, headachy (weird) and sometimes sick too (codeine acts on the vagus nerve - or is this too much detail?).   Valerie

The difference is that whereas wood can just be laid on the bottom of the insert or woodburner to burn, coal needs more air and so must be laid on a cast iron grid or support so there is a good flow of air underneath it.  For our woodburner we could have paid extra for the coal insert but we didn't want it because coal is SOOOOOO expensive (£15 a bag here in UK at the moment and that wouldn't last us a week in winter!!). Valerie

There was a programme on TV last night in the UK about eagle owls which have either colonised or re-colonised the UK - Yorkshire first (people were arguing about whether they were ever here in the first place and made extinct or whether they are new).  Anyhow it was all very interesting - they are enormous birds - apparently right at the top of the food chain - they even take barn owls, buzzards, cats and dogs.  They live in places with rocky ledges and so quarries are popular places for them.  Mostly they eat rabbits but if that prey is decimated by myxomatosis or whatever they go to the next easiest which can be hedgehogs, rats, cats, dogs etc.  Hence there was a bit of a controversy about whether they should be allowed to stay - if the rabbit population was wiped out somewhere, would they take lambs, poultry, rare birds etc? At the very end a voice over said that eagle owls had recently been protected in the EU. Has anyone seen these in France?  If so, whereabouts?  They are apparently moving west at an alarming rate and no-one knows why. Valerie  

Nothing to do with the thread but ... "Coprolite" What on earth possessed/inspired you to choose such an interesting and original name?  Is it a term of endearment used by your wife/husband or are you a coprologist by trade (is there such a thing?).  I had to check your other posts to see whether you were a troll - you know - someone who would liken him/herself to fossilized merde does seem a bit strange!!

According to a book I have: there are red deer in that area but only in very large forests.  Apparently they need a lot of land and cover and you are unlikely to see them anywhere other than the deepest darkest forest. Otherwise roe deer are very common and quite large - their colour is sometimes reddish and so they can be mistaken for red deer - I thought the first one I saw was a red deer but everyone laughed at me - even when I explained it was red:  red deer are much bigger. When I get to France tomorrow I will look at my book which gives regional distribution of vertebrates and let you know what it says for deer in Manche, Calvados and Orne.  I have a feeling there aren't any fallow or muntjac there but I will confirm this later. Valerie

Jon, I have also wondered if the inordinate amount of fresh bread eaten by the French was not only the reason for their longevity but up until recently the reason for their relatively svelte-like physiques.  Whenever I go to France I eat exactly what I want and always lose weight.  I do eat a lot more bread when I am there and I particularly appreciate a baguette - the crustier the better!  So have you investigated polyphenols and their involvement in weight regulation and longevity?  I will do a bit of a search on the internet and get back. Another interesting thing would be to compare mortalities for the regions of France - say comparing Calvados with somewhere like Luberon - the Luberon have a more Meditteranean diet with wine whereas Calvados is famed for the unpasteurised cheeses, cream, cider and Calvados.  I have heard that there is a higher mortality rate from cancer in the North - some put this down to the carcinogenic effects of Calvados.  It could also be the granite in Manche and much of Northern Brittany. When I have been to Greece, Spain and Italy I have usually been given crusty bread to eat  (never been to Portugal). As with any of these epidemiological studies the reason is probably multifactorial but crusty bread is food for thought Valerie Edit:  In the news last week it was reported that coffee consumption is linked to a lower risk of diabetes.  After a bit of research it turns out that polyphenols are brilliant nutrients found in loads of good things and that they can help weight loss, prevent cancer and have cardiovasculoar benefits too: "‘Polyphenols’ are naturally occurring compounds found in fruit, vegetables, tea, coffee, fruit juices, and red wine. Cocoa or chocolate are among the richest sources of polyphenols, including a variety called flavanols and one type in particular known as “proanthocyanidins”."