Orchids in the Renaudière vineyardClick the picture to enlarge it
A couple of years ago I went with our friend Gisèle to visit an orchid grower whose greenhouses are out of the road to Blois, near Contres. We talked to the man who was tending the place, and Gisèle mentioned that she had seen orchids growing in the fields near her house.
The man almost laughed and said, no, that wasn't possible. There are no wild orchids in France, he told us. This weekend I found this site, which says just the opposite. At any rate, the man was categorical and you would have thought he knew what he was talking about, given his job. What's the saying? Trust but verify.
Red maple trees in our front yard arealmost prettier than the flowers
We had a beautiful weekend and I wore myself out on Saturday. Yesterday I just took it easy and read the newspapers on the Internet. Oh, and walked the dog too. Overnight I woke up a couple of times and saw at least a half-dozen flashes of lightning. Storms were predicted, but the ones producing the lightning weren't very close to us because I never heard any thunder.
Deep dark shadows aren't somethingwe are very used to seeing these days
Today I got up early to cook lunch (bœuf aux carottes, a beef stew with carrots, onions, herbs, and white wine) and the sky seemed to be getting darker rather than lighter as the minutes went by. About 9:00 a hard shower of big raindrops fell and soon the clouds were giving us a fine, steady rain. The temperature has fallen by 20 degrees F since yesterday afternoon.
Little blue flowers out in the vineyardThe warm sunny weather was nice while it lasted. On this chilly gray day, the beef stew will be comforting. Here's one more sunny, colorful picture to help chase away the drear.
Tulips just outside the back door
What a wonderful blue! There aren't enough blue flowers in the world. I hope Someone Who Knows will identify these vineyard plants.
ReplyDeleteI assume the orchid grower was chuckling because he thought you meant epiphyte orchids.
There's the slimmest chance of this getting through to you, now that I look at the challenging word verification below. I've lost a few recent comments on your blog this way.
Louise, your comment made it through. Has the word verification scheme changed recently? I don't see it because I'm logged in as, well, me, and Blogger doesn't ask me to identify myself when I leave a comment.
ReplyDeleteOne thing you can do to protect your comments is to select the text and copy it (menus: Edit>Copy or keyboard CTRL + C) just before you try to post it. At that point, you have the text saved in memory and you can paste it back into the text box and try it again.
Ken I am absolutely boggled that an orchid grower/breeder would not know that there are orchids growing wild in France!! France is actually very well known for its native orchids, and has quite a number of rare species. The Société française d'Orchidophilie is very active in the field. The ones in your pic are Early Purple Orchid Orchis mascula
ReplyDeleteCheck out my blog post http://daysontheclaise.blogspot.com/search/label/orchids for an idea of the ones you could see near you very easily.
Louise - the little blue flowers are Speedwell Veronicasp.
Susan
tra la! it's may! the lusty month of may! that terrible month where everyone goes blissfully astray!
ReplyDeletei love the close ups of the flowers. the little white antennae on the little blue ones are fantastic.
happy spring.
Purejuice,
ReplyDeleteYou want to make me rent "Camelot"!
Cheryl