La Mare

There is a little duck pond outside our back gate. It's called une mare in French. When we moved here in 2003, the mare looked like a large puddle filled with brown water and there wasn't much vegetation around it. It looked pretty sad. It was the year of the big heat wave.

La mare aux canards, between our yard and the vineyard.

Over the years, however, the mare has come to life. It's full of frogs, little fish, and water plants are taking it over. I've even seen a pair of colverts, or mallard ducks, hanging out on the water from time to time. And the water looks a lot better than it did when it was brown.

This past spring I saw a guy pull up in his van and get out a fishing pole a couple times. I don't think one is supposed to fish this little pond - I can't imagine what kind of fish would be in there that someone would want.

There's a fence around the mare with a sign affixed that says, "Réserve incendie." That means that the pond is there as a water supply should firefighters need it. It often freezes over in winter, but I've never tried to walk on the ice.

I wonder if the town will try to clean it up as the water weeds take over?

The Vineyard In The Morning

Nearly every day Callie gets two walks out into the vineyard. Ken and I take turns; one of us goes in the morning and the other in the evening, then we switch the next day.

Just starting out on the dirt road behind the house.

Since we're in the vineyard so regularly, we don't often notice the constant changes taking place out there. This is how things look this first week of July. The views are sequential, seen as we walk away from the house out toward the west.

The rows of vines punctuated by pickets.

You can click on the vineyard category (below or in the sidebar) to see the vines at other times of the year if you'd like.

View across a little valley that's the beginning of a stream which runs down to the river.

Ken and I post pictures from out there all the time. The vines have become a part of our daily scene - in fact they're visible from both bedroom windows as well as the window in the bathroom. And, we drink the wine made from their grapes!

Looking toward the northeast, into the sun, out at the far point of the walk.

Periodic Puppy Pics

Last week I promised a video of Callie snapping at the water as it came out of the hose. Here it is!

She is fascinated by running water, even if it's just a trickle dripping out of the hose after it's been turned off. The rug is synthetic, not wool, so don't worry. It can take it.

Oyster Shacks

Around the oyster ponds on the Ile d'Oléron are the little cabanes, or shacks, where people work on the oysters. Inside, they're either separating the baby oysters and putting them into flats, or harvesting the adult oysters, or performing other oyster-related tasks.

A blue shack.

Maybe a few of them are playing cards and drinking wine! The shacks are painted in vibrant colors. I don't know how this tradition began, but I suspect that it's kept up to attract tourists. We weren't the only people out there with cameras!

A yellow shack.

While there were cars parked around the buildings, and some signs of activity, the whole scene was very quiet and peaceful. I think May is on the slow side for oysters. It's a month without an "r" in it, after all.

A red shack.

Of course, once you've stopped once or twice to walk around and take pictures of the colorful shacks, you've pretty much seen them and they begin to look alike. So you move on.

A blue-green shack.

Which is what we did. We continued down the island toward its closest point to mainland, to the town called le Château d'Oléron, where there is actually an old fort. We stopped in to have a quick look.

A shack with new, unpainted siding.

The Oyster Road

The channel side of the Ile d'Oléron is lined with oyster farms. These are mostly rectangular ponds, called claires, in which oysters mature in cages. There really isn't much to see, except for the shacks where the oysters are worked on.

A retail outlet selling oysters, mussels, and island wines, as well the region's special apéritif, pineau des Charentes.

I believe that the claires are connected to the water by means of channels and canals to allow the tide to renew the water and provide food for the oysters. I don't know if oysters raised this way are "fed" by people or allowed to feed on whatever floats by.

Oyster cages are stacked on land until they're ready to be used.

Of course, we could have taken the time to go to the big oyster museum on the island, where I'm certain that every aspect of ostréiculture (oyster farming) would have been explained to us. But we wouldn't have been able to go with the dog, so we skipped it.

Baskets of oyster shells outside an oyster shack.

What I found on the web says that it takes about four years to raise an oyster. They spend the first year in bunches in the channel waters, then the tiny oysters are separated and put into the flat cages to mature, still in the open waters of the channel. It's only in their last three or four months before they're sold that they spend time in the claires.

More from Boyardville

Ken and Callie walking along a jetty at Boyardville.

As I said before, Ken and I took Callie on a short walk to the beach at Boyardville before we headed south toward the oyster ponds.

The channel off Boyardville.

The beach was not crowded, but there were plenty of people out. We went down to the water, sat for a bit, then headed back to town where we met up with Cheryl.

The place where the captain hangs out.

There were plenty of other people with dogs out walking, so we didn't feel out of place. Dogs are most always welcome in most places in France. As someone once misstated a famous saying, it's a doggy dog world.

More dog walkers.

Callie enjoyed the outing. She still doesn't enjoy the riding in the car part, but she's getting better at it.

The end of a jetty.

Weed Eater Pain

When we moved into this house in 2003, I bought a weed-eater. The British would call it a strimmer. In French, it's called une débroussailleuse.

Estragon, or tarragon. One of two plants this year.

It's a big model, heavy, with a two-stroke engine, bad for the environment. But our half-acre was covered in two-foot high weeds and we needed something to tackle that. So we bought the big boy. It worked great for us. The weeds got whacked and the yard has been under control since. But using this big honking weed whacker for weekly trimming is next to impossible.

Lavender in the herb garden.

First, and foremost, there is the string. The nylon cord that actually cuts the weeds ran out. I have tried and tried and tried, but I cannot wind the replacement cord onto the spindle in a way that makes it work. In other words, once the cord is used, one is supposed to be able to tap the spindle on the ground and new cord should unwind automatically, be cut by the handy little cutter blade, and away you go.

Tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant, just starting out.

But no. Once the factory-installed cord ran out, I did my best to replenish it, but it just will not work. Plus, the darned thing is too big and heavy to do the normal yard trimming I have to do. Add to that that I have to buy two-stroke oil and mix oil and gas to fuel it. Yuck.

A red bell pepper plant. Long may it grow!

I got it out this weekend and re-wound the string. I started it up and did some weed whacking in the herb garden, and out on the side of the road along our hedge, where the weeds had gotten pretty thick. It was a pain, but it worked. But the string still won't self-feed.

The weedless roadside, after. I didn't think to take a "before" shot.

We're thinking of getting ourselves a smaller, lighter, electric model for everyday use. Well, not every day, but you know what I mean.

This is what the weeds looked like before, only next to the hedge.

I'm certain the neighbors are sighing, finally, he cut those darned weeds.