Baby Caterpillars

Scattered within the hawthorn and blackthorn bushes are these nests that look like matted cobwebs.  On closer inspection though you can see that they are home to dozens of tiny caterpillars that look very much at home munching the leaves. It's lucky that they move slowly as they are devastating anything and everything in their path.

Having watched these cobweb structures for a few days now we think the black dots might be the caterpillar eggs though unfortunately we don't know what species they are.

Nevertheless it is good to see them as it is more evidence that we are doing the right thing here by leaving lots of wild patches for weeds and trees to grow in.  It may not be the ideal outcome for the caterpillars and butterflies, but they will also make a tasty meal for all of the birds that are also being encouraged by the wild spaces!

Emerging caterpillars eating hawthorn leaves

Alien Caterpillar

Orange Headed Caterpillar

Leaving the city to start a new life in the countryside means that we are seeing many strange looking creatures. We spotted this tiny caterpillar having a good old munch on one of our hawthorn trees.

It stood out because while the other caterpillars had black heads this one had a translucent orange head.  If you let your imagination run riot it looks a bit like an extra from Aliens.

There are lots of these cobweb-like nests strung between small branches of the blackthorn and hawthorn trees. Last month these cobwebs contained a few chrysalis and hundreds of tiny back dots, while now they are full of tiny caterpillars that are feasting on the bushes' leaves.

We don't know what species the caterpillars are but it is good to see them munching wild trees in the fields rather than devastating our veggie patch.

Register an Imported Trailer in France - Part Two

This is the first update to Register an Imported Trailer in France - Part One and covers my progress so far.

Surprisingly, the bureaucracy is working at full steam and I got a response in a couple of days from Service.public.fr who told me that I had to write to DREAL (Direction régionale de l'environnement, de l'aménagement et du logement).  I had come across this organisation previously when I was looking at how to get my cars through their Controle Technique if I couldn't get their Certificates of Conformity.  However, whenever I went to the site the transport section seemed to be focused on heavy vehicles.

Nonetheless, I sent DREAL an email outlining my problem and they've responded asking a pile of questions, such as when was the trailer first registered, who is the manufacturer, what sort of body does it have?  On the face of it, these are all perfectly reasonable except that I either don't know the answers or there isn't an answer.

For example, how to respond to the question about when was it first registered, when in the UK trailers are not registered.  I could say when I bought it, but that feels like a case of not letting a question get in the way of a good answer.  

I suppose that there is no other option but to spend the weekend contemplating the best response and then bang it off first thing Monday morning.

Register an Imported Trailer in France - Part One

They always say that pride comes before a fall and I am beginning to think that it might just be true.

We were preening ourselves at having put our second car through its Controle Technique on Monday and registering it on Tuesday.  How brilliant we were, anticipating the roadblocks that the functionaries would put in our way and deftly steering around them.  

Until that is we went to the insurance broker and the subject of the trailer came up.  Being from the UK, it never occurred to me to mention the trailer to the broker previously as it didn't really seem relevant.

Wrong.  Now, I know that this will come as a real surprise to all of you, but in France there's a rule about trailers.  Actually, being France there are quite a lot of rules, but the main one is that if the total loaded weight is more than 500kg then it has to have its own registration document.

No problem there, just go to the prefecture and get one, the French wouldn't want to make it difficult would they?  Well, strangely enough it's not that easy.  First, you need to provide the Certificate of Conformity, but of course in the whole of Europe only France requires this, so no trailers sold outside France have one.  It crossed my mind that this is a bit like a trade barrier, but France is at the heart of the EU so that can't possibly be the case.

So, if you can't get a Certificate of Conformity how do you register the trailer?  Simple, you get it tested and authorised.  But, by whom?  When you go to the website of the government agency that is responsible you find that it has been disbanded and there is no useful information on who would be responsible for the tests.

So, I've written to Service-Public.fr, le site officiel de l’administration française, to ask them who is responsible.  I can't do anything else now except wait and see.  Ahh, the joy of starting life afresh in France!

Toads At Home

As avid followers will know, at the beginning of May we put a box in the ground in which to put the earth connection for our electrical supply.  Since the picture was taken we have put a lid on it so that it looks like a square manhole.  Nothing exciting there.

As we walked past the box this morning though a little head popped out of the cutout that acts as a handle.  "There can't be anything living in there", exclaimed Mrs Riotlife as I lifted the lid to show two toads.  One of them was small, dark and almost smooth so we think that he was very young, while the other was much more toady; brown, warty, baggy and about twice as big.

It is incredible that they can get in and out of the hole as it is about a foot deep with vertical concrete sides. Though having watched them climbing fence posts in the past we know they are very good at scaling vertical surfaces.  It is excellent that they have found somewhere safe to live as too often they live somewhere that is not safe from us, like under the car wheels.

Thunder and Rain

I wondered why the old combine harvester was out until after 10 last night harvesting the barley on a nearby field.

Normally these musings of an ex-pat are left unresolved but this morning I was woken up before 7 by the most wonderful sound of gentle rain cascading down the roof and and thunder rumbling across the sky.

I was so excited that I couldn't help but get up and, figuratively speaking, put pen to paper.

Now you might think that this is a bit strange being happy at this turn of events, but since the heatwave broke a couple of weeks ago we've had grey skies, high winds and humidity but no rain to speak of. Which meant we have still been watering the shrubs and veggies.

I'll give it ten minutes before I go out to check the water butts.  They need to be a bit like Goldilocks' porridge; not too full, not too empty but just right. 

Better Bureaucracy

Like most people, both ex-pats and locals, I find that the state in France intrudes too much into my life and is generally unhelpful.  However, having now successfully transferred both our cars onto French plates there are signs that the central government's modernisation programme may be helping to reduce the power of individual functionaries who make up the rules as they go along.

Our local prefecture in Blois has one young man who is responsible for granting you a French registration document (Carte Grise).  The first time we went to him, he sent us off as we needed to get a Quitus Fiscal.  Having got that, we then did some research and found that we also needed a Certificate of Conformity, which he hadn't mentioned.  It is quite clear that the intention was that we would return to the prefecture and be sent away.

Never mind though, we waited weeks to get the Certificate of Conformity and went back to Blois with all of our papers in order to get a provisional registration certificate.  Ahh, he said after taking all of the information off the Certificate of Conformity and issuing the provisional registration certificate, it is in English so you need to get it translated by an authorised translator for the full registration document. 

Knowing that this wasn't really needed we took the documents, including the newly granted Controle Technique, to Tours where, other than the three hour queue to be served, there was no problem with any of the documentation and we were given our Carte Grise there and then.

Now for car number two; we'd been through the process once so we knew what we were up against.  Back to Blois (it's much closer than Tours) and up to the booth where the young man makes his pronouncements.  One by one to his chagrin we peeled off the documents.  We were smiling inside thinking that there was no way he could refuse to issue the Carte Grise.  Oh, how foolish we felt when he got to the Certificate of Conformity.  It's in English he says, but that's fine it doesn't need to be translated, but it can't be a duplicate.  But we pointed out, this is what Saab sent.  Maybe in England, but not in France was the response.

Dejected and cowed, we beat a retreat knowing that we had been bested by the gatekeeper.  However, we set off to Tours again.  And again, no problem at all.

So, the brilliance of the modernised regime is that while there may still be parochial little functionaries making up the rules as they go along with the sole intention of making the public's lives as miserable as their own, you can now beat them by bypassing them.  Impeccable!

Second Car Has Its Controle Technique

We've had a massive success today, getting our UK registered Saab through its Controle Technique (French MOT).

We thought that we had to have French registration but both the prefecture and the MOT centre confirmed that we didn't, although I'm sure that this was not what they said for the first car.  However, the first car was stressful and we're a long way from being fluent in French so we may have misunderstood.

Now with that one ticked off it's off to Tours one day this week to see if we can get a French registration.  If they accept that the Certificate of Conformity is OK in English and as a duplicate then we are home and dry.  They accepted it for our other Saab so we are hopeful, although expecting consistency from the prefecture is a bit of wishful thinking.

However, we go to Tours for most things these days as it is much more cosmopolitan than Blois, our local prefectural town.

This article details the steps we took for both the first and second cars 

Forester Moth

Forester moth on flower

We had trouble identifying this moth as to us it looked more blue than green and there do not appear to be any blue moths in our part of the world. However after trawling the web we can confidently say it is a green Forester moth.

The Forester moth is very beautiful and certainly one to watch out for. A day-flying moth, the iridescent greeny-blue wings really catch the sunlight making it one of the more eye-catching moths.

I love the contrast of colours in this picture of the Forester moth on the bright yellow flower.

Kitchen Units

Old farmhouse kitchen being renovated

The old kitchen units here are quite unlike anything you would find at B&Q.

The units had sides made of yet more of the ubiquitous plaster blocks that cloak all of our walls.  Attached to these and the floor were bespoke oak doors in wooden frames which we've managed to take off without damaging them.  They will need some cleaning to get rid of 20 years of cooking from them, but they are really solid and they suit the house.

We thought about using them in our new kitchen but the doors are all non-standard size, don't have drawers and are incredibly low but with a bit of tweaking we hope that we can reuse them in one of the new offices cum workrooms.