MAYDAY..MAYDAY.........
We are approaching the beginnning of May, that remarkable month in France when there seem to be more public holidays than there are days of the week.
French public holidays are not like British ones. There are more of them for a start, and some of them are not tied to a particular day - for example we do not have to have a holiday on a Monday (as in Bank Holiday Monday, in the UK). It falls on the appropriate day of the week. If the date happens to fall on a Sunday, then there is no other day taken as a day in lieu - the public holiday is on the Sunday and no working day is lost. However, the French very cleverly compensate for this by helping themselves to days which 'bridge the gap' should a public holiday fall on, for example, a Tuesday. They will 'faire le pont' and take Monday off as well - as there is little point in going back to work for one day only to take the next one off as a public holiday. So May - with holidays on the 1st, 8th, 9th, 19th and 20th this year - can be a nightmare.
All of this bears no relationship to this blog, except to say that May 1st and 8th are interesting for gardeners in this part of the world. Traditionally on May 1st little girls give their mothers a bunch of lily of the valley. Lily of the valley grows prolifically in this part of France and we have lots of it in the garden. Mme D'Incau, the previous owner, took great pains to point out where it would grow to me when we bought the house. We moved in during January, when the lily of the valley was hidden underground and she was, quite rightly in my view, very anxious that I did not inadvertently dig it up. I didn't and it is still there.
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This year the weather has been so slow to warm up that we are behind seasonally and the morning TV news programme earlier this week ran a feature on how the professional lily of the valley growers were having to take measures to force the plants into flower in time for May 1st. Happily, here in the garden ours are flowering on schedule - as you will see from the picture. The scent when I walk past them is intoxicating and I do think that the prolongued wet weather we have had recently has helped the plants spread.
The second public holiday is on May 8th and that is the day upon which Monsegur (in the Gironde) holds its flower show. It is no Chelsea, but it is great fun and the variety of plants on offer seems to me to improve every year. When we first moved here it seemed to be all bedding plants and hybrid tea style roses, but now there are more and more perennials and specialists selling things like hydrangeas and grasses. The variety of roses is also expanding with some lovely old fashioned names appearing. Last year I bought Rosa Sally Holmes and I am curious to see how she will fare this year. Like the lily of the valley she is behind where she was last year....I can't see any buds forming yet. Watch this space.
French public holidays are not like British ones. There are more of them for a start, and some of them are not tied to a particular day - for example we do not have to have a holiday on a Monday (as in Bank Holiday Monday, in the UK). It falls on the appropriate day of the week. If the date happens to fall on a Sunday, then there is no other day taken as a day in lieu - the public holiday is on the Sunday and no working day is lost. However, the French very cleverly compensate for this by helping themselves to days which 'bridge the gap' should a public holiday fall on, for example, a Tuesday. They will 'faire le pont' and take Monday off as well - as there is little point in going back to work for one day only to take the next one off as a public holiday. So May - with holidays on the 1st, 8th, 9th, 19th and 20th this year - can be a nightmare.
All of this bears no relationship to this blog, except to say that May 1st and 8th are interesting for gardeners in this part of the world. Traditionally on May 1st little girls give their mothers a bunch of lily of the valley. Lily of the valley grows prolifically in this part of France and we have lots of it in the garden. Mme D'Incau, the previous owner, took great pains to point out where it would grow to me when we bought the house. We moved in during January, when the lily of the valley was hidden underground and she was, quite rightly in my view, very anxious that I did not inadvertently dig it up. I didn't and it is still there.
.jpg)
This year the weather has been so slow to warm up that we are behind seasonally and the morning TV news programme earlier this week ran a feature on how the professional lily of the valley growers were having to take measures to force the plants into flower in time for May 1st. Happily, here in the garden ours are flowering on schedule - as you will see from the picture. The scent when I walk past them is intoxicating and I do think that the prolongued wet weather we have had recently has helped the plants spread.
The second public holiday is on May 8th and that is the day upon which Monsegur (in the Gironde) holds its flower show. It is no Chelsea, but it is great fun and the variety of plants on offer seems to me to improve every year. When we first moved here it seemed to be all bedding plants and hybrid tea style roses, but now there are more and more perennials and specialists selling things like hydrangeas and grasses. The variety of roses is also expanding with some lovely old fashioned names appearing. Last year I bought Rosa Sally Holmes and I am curious to see how she will fare this year. Like the lily of the valley she is behind where she was last year....I can't see any buds forming yet. Watch this space.
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