Gulfoss (Iceland)
Thrilling through basalt rock
gushing from ice-sea to moss-lined ravine
virginal water once channeled now spreads
in a calm sheenflow
wide her sweep across stone
silk-lace in layers, her wedding dress
in white folds descending
sunbeams celebra…
Clamming in Ninilchik, Alaska
Razor clams here are the size of babies’ hands
opened up to catch the midnight sun.
They roll in with the tide and lie on sand
full and fleshy, their tumbling journey done.
Above, a Russian church, its golden dome
a gleaming refuge for those who…
Exit Glacier, Kenai Fjords National Park, Alaska
This crack in your iceflesh thawing
like a crease in the mouth of your womb
you are melting in sighs
I hear breath and the wrench of the first opening
as you yield to the world’s warmi…
Loon (on Lake Denise, Soldotna, Alaska)
It’s the call over still water
echoing round the bay of my mind
some yearning, undefined
A loon owns this lake
at dusk and at dawn reminding us
of things unresolved.
We row out to find him
smooth grey feathers impervious to rain.
King of …
Glow Worm
Cup in hand I take my tea at midnight
down a darkening track
lush chestnut oak and elm hang heavy
wheat field hushed, summer breeze between the husks halted.
Silence is a darkness too familiar.
Breath of cattle huddled by the fence
shadows si…
Cormorant on the Westman Islands, Iceland
He hangs out his wings to dry
soggy his dive
lazy on lava he loiters, waits
for whatever flounder dare wander
in harbour waters
beneath his razor-sharp rock.
Hungry, daggerbeak hook-tipped
aloof
quick wing-tuck, neck-stretch
so sudden the plunge to survive.
Cranes, Cook Inlet, Alaska
Like a queen’s downy bed fluffed up for the loving
featherlace wings drifting aloft
they glide with the wind
two graceful lovers sweep over Cook Inlet
calling to the snowbound range.
It echoes back beckoning
they sway over scree
brittle legged…
Jaeger Bird, Barrow, Alaska
He flies in ribbons like my hair undone
loosely in this arctic breeze
like a kite in the wind his long tail trailing
above melting icefloe, along costal freeze
Jostled by Ghosts
You never would imagine he could close up like that,
like an oyster, wrinkled mouth sealed shut
contours of hermetic rock.
I tried to prize him out of his privacy,
bore through the crustaceous shell
but everyone told me he was impenetrable.
…
Master Mountain, Denali, Alaska
Master mountain sighs his enormity
weeps in small gullies at the weight he holds,
despairs of immensity, too big to hold himself
mountain shifts, avalanche of granite and schist
slate sliding down to a clear glacial stream.
Yet he holds his head…
In my father’s garden
I live in my father’s garden
celebrate our conversations
summer lighting up the roses
pink carnations spreading scents and memory.
Crocuses – another spring –
we talk of children growing up
summer seeping through our thoughts
I hold …
Alternative medecine: moles
On the barbed wire fence by the farm up the road we counted 120 moles strung up in the sun like socks hung out to dry. A gruesome encounter. The local mole catcher had been by. He gets paid per mole, has to prove his catch and he’d clearly earned …
An Orthodox Tlingit in Alaska
We were sitting on the steps of an orthodox church, its gold-tipped dome shimmering like a glorious crown in the sun. It stood on a bluff above the sandy clamming beaches, overlooking Cook Inlet and from our vantage point we could see in the distanc…
Leprosy and La Chapelle Saint Thomas
The small Leper colony in the woods down the hill with its Saint Thomas Chapel dates back to the 12th Century. We have been coming here on our walks for the last 15 years. It is surrounded by a high flint wall now taken over by the rampant vegetation.
Doctor Who?
The medical face of Fra…
Whaling, ancient and modern
Many are familiar with paintings and sketches of men in open boats on high waves hurling harpoons at giant whales. From the Japanese to the Basques, the British in the South Seas, the Norwegians, the Yankees, the Greenlanders – the list is long, we …
Iceland’s geothermal standard
After visiting the geothermal glasshouses in Flúðir, Iceland, and hearing about rising electricity costs despite all the waterfalls and geothermal hotspots in the …
Independent People: Iceland, Fire and (pr)ice
“The love of freedom and independence has always been characteristic of the Icelandic People.” Independent People, by Halldor Laxness, Nobel Prize in Literature.
A Whale of a Time
Barrow Whaling Festival: the Nalukataq
The fog stretched out like a grey pall beneath us. Visibility was nil; we were as if wrapped in a blinding cocoon as our airplane roared, swung up then down then up again and do…
Paris a rival for London, Berlin? Les folies de grandeur
The titanic operations to create ‘Grand Paris’ are under way. From now until 2030, a huge new rail infrastructure around Paris linking the suburbs, together with seven new economic ‘clusters’, will be born – – or rather laboured into a very slow birth. Cost: 3 billion euros.
Kotzebue(ty) in Alaska
It was the 4th of July and we were in the Iñupiat town of Kotzebue, the largest community in Northwest Alaska. Kotzebue is on the Chukchi Sea north of the Bering Sea and opposite Russia, some 50 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle. Before the Europeans came it was a major Arctic trading port between the Russians and the Iñupiat Eskimos who traded in fur, skins and seal-oil, and later in gold. Trade increased with the arrival of the whale boats and missionaries.
May Day, rickets, and the Forêt de Brotonne
On May the 1st we took to the woods. If you go down a track in the Forêt de Brotonne – the Forest of Brotonne – you’ll come across a small chapel: the Chapelle Saint Maur. It is surrounded by beech trees and horn…
Mud and Massacre: Verdun 100 years on
France and Germany come together today, 29th May 2016, at Verdun to commemorate the centenary of the longest and one of the fiercest battles of World War 1, the Battle of Verdun. After 300 days, it left 163 000 dead (Fren…
To Bee or not to Bee
If you went down to our woods eight years ago you’d have heard and seen ten beehives 
amongst the birches. …
Bee Flash
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Spot the Bee with the number plate in London
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courtesy: BBC.[/capti…
I’m All Right Jack. What the French say about Brexit.
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“Union” Jack?[/captio…
Glyphosate: the War on Weeds
[multilanguage_switcher]The five-acre field up our road stretched out like a yellow pall under the sky, desiccated. The local farmer had sprayed it before re-ploughing and sowing his next crop. He sprayed it with glyphosate – what dosage we’ll ne…
The cat’s in the spinney and wears his white pinny
France votes in ban on neonicotinoids
The ban in France on neonicotinoids takes effect on 1st September 2018. Dispensations for farmers will be possible up to July 2020. Industrial giants Bayer and Syngenta warn of economic and agricultural deadlock while there are no plausible
Feast and Famine: Icelandic “Moss”
In Iceland, vast swathes of silvery moss spread over endless stretches of land which has been ripped up by volcanic shifts and eruptions. Unlike the chaotic, jagged basalt boulders and the ravines beneath, the moss lies like a smooth blanket, or …
Archangels and Angelica
A half crazed warrior Thorgeir and his poet brother Thormod were in the Icelandic mountains picking angelica for their soups, salads, and medicinal remedies. At a place known as Thorgeir’s ledge, near Hornstrandir in the Western Fjords where the …
France’s environmental dilemma
Great laws; too bad they’re not applied
Two expert reports on the state of the environment in France were published this July, one by the French National Agency for Health Security Anses (Agence nation…
Arctic Shaman’s Seance
The snow fell quietly, covering the settlement in a thick white blanket. The shaman had told Okwana she’d recognize the singing hut by the large narwhal ivory which jutted up out of the roof; it whistled when the wind raced over the ice, he’d said. …
Mess, manure, and anaerobic digesters
A messy subject, but important for our environment and economics. Manure is still massively under-exploited. Alone, it is a fertilizer full of pathogens which get spread back onto the fields. But put through a methane digester under anaerobic c…
The Royal Jack and the Knight of Malta
[multilanguage_switcher]‘Base muleteers of France… dare not take up arms like gentlemen!’ (Shakespeare, 1 Henry VI, III.ii.68.)
Mules and muleteers have played a key role in the world’s economic growth; without their hard work, stam…
Brydon Thomason
Green gas : winds of change in France
Source: l’express. afp.com/Martin Bureau[/…
Isolation and Reciprocity
There is much talk of desertification of the countryside in France, with people leaving for the big towns and cities; doctors are difficult to find in small communities, jobs are rare, and city lights…
Changing Legislation: Agro-Chemicals in France
Gardeners beware: labels can lie
Train
The short story entitled Le Train which you can read on the…
Endocrine disruptors: more needs to be done
- withdrawal of ‘suspected’ endocrine disru…
Know your endocrine disruptors
It is difficult n…
Bio-boom in France: from Agro-chemicals to Bio farming
Going Green? What the French presidential candidates propose
Controversial weed killer glyphosate cleared by European Chemicals Agency
Bee-killing neonicotinoids to be banned by European Commission
Apollo Asteroid 2014 JO25
Apollo asteroid 2014 JO25 is expected to brush by Earth tonight missing us by 1.8 million km. Asteroids and comets both orbit the Sun. Asteroids are rocky, whereas comets are icy. T…
Raise your own: beekeeping in France
President Macron’s ecology transition plans: mixed messages
Flax
Alone against the storm she fights while others
bow and wait, hide and bend for cover,
dare…
Bisphenol A recognized unanimously as an endocrine disruptor by ECHA
Neonicoinoids: sales up in France, despite ban.
MAIZE
The Harvest Ball
There was a little girl who wore oak leaves in her hair
red berries round her milk-white neck, and a crazy stare.
Her dress was made of lace which hung like mist around her feet
and round her wrists an amethyst as purple as her blood.
Her mot…
France’s Estates General for Food: Help the Farmers
Glyphosate and Alternative Farming
Glyphosate: EC vote postponed
European Parliament vetoes criteria on endocrine disruptors
La Chasse, The Hunt
Air Pollution across Europe: launch of new online real-time map
Glyphosate. Voted in for another 5 years by the European Union
The 28 countries of the EC have finally voted today – by a majority of one – in favour of renewing the use of glyphosate for another five years. 16 votes out of the 28 countries were needed to clinch the deal, representing 65% of the EU populatio…
Criminal complaints filed against UE on glyphosate approval
Lack of trust in European institutional actions reigns. The Austrian NGO Global 2000 and the European branch of the world-wide NGO Pesticide Action Network…
Help save our pollinators: EU online public consultation opened
Water: What are you drinking… really?
And how much are you paying for this water?
At the price…
France’s International Agricultural Salon: 24 February – 4 March
President Macron is …
GLOBAL RECYCLING DAY, 18 MARCH 2018
Global Recycling Day. See how you can contribute to recycling by clicking here
Farmers to the rescue: France’s renewables
Mapping the world’s soil; increasing the world’s carbon stocks
Agricultural land prices: France and Europe
New figures out from Eurostat on 21 March show that the most expensive agricultural land in some 20 European Union countries lies in he Netherlands, fetching an average of €63.000 euros per hectare (€791 for rental), and in the region of Liguria in I…
Neonicotinoids : EU proposes stricter bans
The European Commission proposed on 27 April a ban on the use – in open air – of three neonicotinoids clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiamethoxam.
These substances have already been under partial ban for several years and have been subject of muc…
World Environment Day
World Environment Day falls on 5th June each year. This year the focus is on beating plastic pollution. Sign up for updates, and check in on UN Environment’s Executive Director, Erik Solheim, in conversati…
Energy Transition in France: Public debate
The French are being invited by the government to participate in an online public debate to enhance the 2015 law on Energy Transition for Green Grown. The platform is open to all and encourages the public to…
World Oceans Day
Find out what’s going on near you at www.worldoceansday.org, and prevent plastic pollution,encourage solutions for a healthy ocean.
…
Air Pollution: Is Paris Gasping? And the rest of the world?
The Eiffel Tower beckons us from a distance as we drive in to Paris on the motorway from Normandy. Her graceful shape will never cease to give me that moment’s thrill when approaching – the same thrill I had when I first arrived in this city decade…
Farmers and Beekepers together ?
A European Bee Partnership, the first ever integrated approach of its kind in Europe, was launched last Friday 29th June at the outcome of the European Parliament’s Bee Week.
The idea of the Partnersh…
New figures for agricultural land, France. Dirt cheap?
Official figures are just out – 4 July – giving the average market value of agricultural land in France (2017). Prices are in Euros per hectare (hectare = ‘are’ in French). A hectare is 10.000 square metres. Consult the grid here.
https://www.legi…
Desert Hyena
He asked to be forgiven
clutched his head with worn-out fingers
clean white nails filed evenly
moon-shaped….
House of Shells
(illustration by French artist Christine Chamson)
He came washed up, limbs wavering
shells caught in the net of his Sargasso hair
the glint of the sea lodged in his eye
the roar of its jubilance caged in his ear.
His mouth was a cavern of wo…
Normandy injects €12million into ambitious Methanisation Plan
Roads mired in muck, villagers stiffling with smells: It’s a sorry litany of stories up here in my neck of the woods in Normandy when it comes to anaerobic digesters. Normandy only has 6 such installations so far, two of which are in my neighbourhoo…
L’avenir de l’eau Bassin Seine-Normandie : consultation publique
For local residents and beyond: your opinion counts.
From 2 November until 2 May 2019 : Public consultation of official documents concerning the future management of water and flooding in the Seine basin and in water courses along the Norm…
October : The Hunt
They’re shooting pigeons up in the air
shooting wild boar berserk in the woods,
they sway in the corn with their rifles loaded
aim with the warm red wine in their veins
shoot their leader in the foot
shoot their neighbour on the shins
…
Hunting Season in France
Out for a walk this beautiful Sunday afternoon I took the lane along the corn field. The upright cornstalks tower over your head and the slight wind rustles their drying leaves – the only noise to be heard in this haven away from the urban crush. Unt…
France’s agricultural land fast diminishing despite environmental policies
Where have all the crops gone? And the cows? A vast stretch of farmland up here in our part of Normandy has been laid waste in the next village, the earth churned up in places and, elsewhere, smoothed out like a pall under the autumn sky.
Pall i…
The end of glyphosate: French government online website opens to share alternatives
Le 1er février le gouvernment a mis en ligne le centre de ressources pour accompagner les agricultuers dans la sortie du glyphosate.
Vous y trouverez des techniques alternatives, ex. association de plantes compagnes gélives sur colza; la herse ét…
Young French Farmers Unite for Europe
Crowds throng the stand of the young French farmers’ union ‘Jeunes Agriculteurs’ at this year’s international agricultural show in Paris. An enormous panel has been erected setting out their Charter for the future of Agriculture.
Politicians and d…
International Women’s Day : Women Farmers in France
To mark international women’s day today, here are some figures for women farmers in France, just been published by the French agricultural social security body the MSA. Figures are for 2017:
- One out of four farm managers in France is a w…
Devolution: Europe’s proposed new agricultural policy
For farmers up here in Normandy, Brussels – whose Commission regulates farming practices throughout Europe – seems very far away. And so does Paris. They say that neither the European Commission nor the French government have a realistic notion of …
Notre Dame de Paris
Speechless and desperately sad in front of Notre Dame in flames. This cathedral is the…
Return of the Normande and the Camembert Wars
My horse gave me a lesson in more ways than one not long ago. I was riding her down a beautiful stretch here in Normandy when suddenly she started hyperventilating and twisted her body round as if to turn back. I coaxed her on to no avail and, with…
Food Safety: pesticide residues – or not – in your food?
The European Food Safety Authority EFSA has just published its 2017 annual report on pesticide residues in food in EU Member States, Iceland and Norway.
Whereas t…
Herd mentality: in the moo(d) for love
In the Moo(d) for love.
I took a walk down my lane yesterday. On my right is the field with the brown cows, calves, and Mr. Big Bull with the ring in his nose (check him out on my kilometre walk during lockdown, he’s quite a beast). Further down…
Agricultural Land Prices: France and Europe 2019
Agricultural land prices in Europe are declining in the UK, France, Slovenia, and Denmark, according to Eurostat’s latest figures*.
The figures are for 2017, and were published end May this year; prices can be compared to previous years’, going back…
Lubrizol. deadly explosion in Rouen
The fall-out from the spectacular explosion of the chemical factory Lubrizol near Rouen on 26th September not only nearly asphyxiated local inhabitants with clouds of soot swirling in the air, it has also infiltrated the soil a…
Good conditions for setting up Anaerobic Digesters in Normandy
Conditions at present are good to set up anaerobic digesters in Normandy: subsidies for connecting to networks are now available, contract rates are favourable and you can benefit from help from farmers who pioneered the first installations at a mee…
Why Dutch and Belgian Farmers choose France
At our New Year’s drinks party at the local Mairie (Town Hall) in rural Normandy, our regional MP dared speak up about French attitudes during this period of the longest strikes France has ever seen. She said we are getting a reputation as a nation …
Isolated but on your marks: join the bird census!
Amateurs d’oiseaux et de la faune, allons-y pour positiver nos vies actuelles en participant au recensement de ces espèces qui visitent votre jardin ou l’arbre ou l’espace vert qui serait tout près de votre domicile. L’heure est à eux en ce…
My kilometre: the hidden riches of a small patch
Taking advantage of our one kilometre/one hour rule here in France, here is what nature is doing this Spring week in my kilometre. How about checking out your perimetre in your neighbourhood, on your jog, on your walk, or even from your window?
In c…
Another lockdown kilometre in Normandy
In fact it’s the same kilometre, Covid19 oblige, one month on from the last post. Trying to make the most of it, hope this cheers people up who are stuck in a small apartment in a city.
Agriculture Week in France, 13-24 May
Evénements à la ferme, dans les champs dans les régions, et événements en ligne.
Man and Mule
Discover “Man and Mule,” a poignant fiction by Angela Jane Howard that explores the connection between humans, animals, and nature.
A French Christmas, The Log, then and now
On Christmas day 1066 William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy, was crowned King of England in Westminster Abbey. The English and French who were present cheered the new King so loudly that the clamour alarmed and panicked the French soldiers waiting…
Robin
Robin, as you sing your red breast swells
between the frosty branches in this wintry glow.
You cock your head and listen to the bells
Gold Panning
Don’t forget the dusky red garnet, the ephemeral flicker of yellow pyrite, the flash of silver as the water recedes…
Song Thrush, Normandy
Beneath this cloud-spread sky you sing head high for some lost mate, or for the joy to thrive through storms, and glide through orchards ripe with apples, cherries, berries, pears and leaves all dappled with the shy sun’s rays…
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