Monday, 1 December 2014

The Touraine Loire Valley in December


December is the least sunny month of the year, with well under 100 sunshine hours, average maximum temperatures of around 10° and average minimums of around 0°.

Hoar frost on our neighbour's wall last December.
 Pixie Cups Cladonia sp, a type of lichen, in the woods between Richelieu and Chinon.
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Loire Valley Nature: A new entry has been added for Agricultural Land Habitat.
Photos have been added to the Violet Limodore Limadorum abortivum entry.
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A la cuisine hier: Far Breton, a sort of halfway between flan and clafoutis. I used lait ribot (Breton style buttermilk) and my homemade 2013 vin de noix, which is very nicely raisiny and port like these days.

2 comments:

Tim said...

I love the Cladonia group...
so photogenic...
some like safety matches...
others, Swan Vesta matches...
pixie caps like these...
[with the unforgettable Latin name C.pixydata]...
and C.coccifera...
pixies caps for Christmas with their red edges..
as well as mini-trees from the common moorland one that is incorrectly named "Reindeer Moss"...
as an ex-railway modeller, I have used bags of that...
some "died" in strange colours... some au-naturel.

And as for sunshine....
day breaks... the sun rises....
less and less 'till the equinox...
but it is out there somewhere...
we are less than ten hours in and I feel like migrating with the grues....
when I went to let the Wayne and the gals out...
it was bleedin' nithering!!

Susan said...

Tim: Cladonia is a fave of mine too.

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