In September this year, we had 16 days with no precipitation at all. Still, we had about 60 mm of rain over the course of the month. In October, we had just 11 days without rain, and a total of 100 mm of rain fell on the other 20 days,mostly toward the end of the month. Today it's November 10, and we've had just 2 rainless days so far, with a total of 53 mm of rain the rainy days. After a very dry summer, we seem to be in for a very wet autumn. What's today's forecast? Rain, of course.
Luckily, had a lot of dry days were in the first part of October and the grapes were all harvested before the real autumn rains began.
With all the rain that's been falling for the last two or three weeks, mushrooms are blooming everywhere. I don't think we can be sure the drought is over yet, but the ground has soaked up a lot water. We haven't had any flooding, but the Charente and Charente-Maritime area, where we were on a road trip in early October, along with the very northern tip of France, have been inundated. Rivers in both areas have overflowed.
These are not photos I've taken recently. I found them in my archives. All are from Novembers past. We live on the northern edge of this vineyard near the town of Saint-Aignan in the Loire Valley region.
Ahhh, the seasons... they go round and round, eh? :)
ReplyDeleteAt about 4:30 yesterday afternoon, I was getting ready to go out for a walk with Tasha when I realized it had started raining really hard. I waited 15 minutes and the rain stopped. One summer when CHM was in Paris, the weather turned very rainy. I would call him every few days and ask him: Est-ce qu'il pleut à Paris ce matin? Pas encore, he would answer.
DeleteI'm guessing none of those mushrooms are edible, but who knows? I think one would have to be pretty experienced to gather in the wild.
ReplyDeleteOne thing we can do here is take gathered mushrooms to a pharmacy to find out if they are edible or not, or even toxic or deadly. Pharmacists are trained for that.
DeleteWe were forecast (as I recall!) to have a rainy week, so I was not expecting to be able to play pickleball with my friends on our outside public courts, yet I played the last two days and I have agreed to play again today at 2:00. We did have some hours of heavy rain this week, I was just lucky and we had enough people to roll off the courts and then schedule playtimes after they were totally dry. Lucky for the grape harvesting before the rains, too!
ReplyDeleteDiogenes - they offer mushroom classes/walks/dog training during the season...I haven't noticed any announcements this year but I have in the past. Truffle hunting is happening here, too! I have a cat, so I won't sign up (hee-hee!).
No rain in the forecast today, but it's supposed to rain overnight. Some rain tomorrow around mid-day and again in the evening and overnight. In California, it rained from November to about May, and then no rain over the summer. France seems to be developing a California climate.
ReplyDelete