Year of "The Great Drought" ?

Returning to Le Port on the 26th May was to find a sweltering heat which dissipated the next day as a cold front passed over and temperatures dropped to a maximum below 20c.  It was clear from the local papers and chats to local people that high temperatures and drought were the cause of some anxiety, especially to livestock farmers because the hay crop had been very light. This was clear in the field where some grasses were at head height but there was quite a lot of space in what should have been dense lower cover. Most of the roses are already over with the buff rose and Albertine which would be expected to be in full flower, just showing the last blooms over a mass of untidy blown flowers.

The walnuts are amazing, already very large, in doubles with a few triplets, and not a trace of blight  on any tree! Those on M. Besse's Grossjean - a single large tree on the border- are already very large and it looks although the fall will start before mid September, a full three weeks early. The nuts are swelling well so the trees are having no trouble with the drought so far. Could they be tapped into the water table? Likewise the vines look although they will be very productive and the blight on their leaves was minimal. Those leaves that did have some disease I picked and put in the rubbish bin to stop infection of other leaves.  The lack of blight fits in with the idea that this bacterial disease is spread by water droplets during rainfall.

Although three hours were spent in the field there was  a notable lack of butterflies or insects in general to be seen. This may be due to the cold dry SW wind that was blowing. A number of male darkly marked meadow browns were seen, plus one marbled white and a newly hatched blue which was not identified as the cool meant that it kept its wings outstretched for the sun's warmth so there was no opportunity to photograph the underside.  The lime trees are in flower but at evening the vast nectar treasure trove was been taken advantage of by only a solitary bumble bee.  Where is the factory like hum of a flowering lime tree in summer?

As soon as I arrived I was mobbed by the black redstarts which have young newly on the wing. The parents are very nervous and were encouraging a great tit and a greenfinch to mob me but although they arrived on the scene of the crime they just looked a bit bemused and soon went off elsewhere.  A falcon, possibly a peregrine was heard calling as it passed through the trees earlier in the day so this may have alarmed the birds in general. The serins are singing in the walnuts, including the big one by the dove cot which is a favourite singing post for them every year.

There has been little rain since the New Year and none is forecast. When fronts come in from the Atlantic they are absorbed by anticyclonic cells. When one passed through on 27th all it was able to yield was five minutes of heavy drizzle and nothing more.  Are we seeing the start of one of the great drought years of the last two hundred years in France? Most department are already on drought regulations and Dordogne is one of the four on the highest grade.  Spain has had heavy thundery rain for the last two months or so, but very little of it manages to pass north over the Pyranees and into South West France. We shall see.