Hillbillies are coming to Town

The Real Food Festival at Earls Court in London is nearly upon us, 7th to 10th May,we are busy trying to finish all our work here in time to drive upto London on Tuesday next to set up ready for the show starting on Friday. Anybody wanting a free ticket for the Sunday or Monday we have a limited stock and will hand them out on a F.C.F.Served basis so if you want a great day out and meet the hillbillies from the deep south west of France and even better want to purchase some wine or beer or place an order, you better get in touch fast!!! Hope to see you soon,David

Jamie Goode, he of the wine gang fame asked could we be included in the natural wine groupment last year. Well it’s so debatable what natural means, something different to whoever, you choose to ask?

For me its using the natural flora and fauna to encourage the good bugs to overcome the bad bugs in simple terms!!!Seeing these orchids growing in the vineyard is great, they encourage the good bugs ,ladybirds etc. I will print some pictures of some of the vineyards that use purely chemical weed control and chemicals to kill any growth from the stem, yes it works, its cheap and its quick but as far as I’m concerned it makes a totally sterile zone which the bad bugs manage to reasserts their numbers before the good bugs can take control unless you re apply the chemicals, a viscous circle as far as I'm concerned occurs and its just a recipe for using more chemical weeedkillers.
We've steered away fro this over the last 15 years and even our technician, who is pro chemical has admitted that our system has worked, as long as we don't push for higher yields we are O.K. Its common sense really I see the same happening with the modern dairy cow for example it comes back to the old adage of everything in moderation!!!!! and if you push things to hard they get stressed and then are open to attack!!! Your thoughts please.

Time seems to fly by and there is never enough time to get everything done, either that or Sarah and I are just getting older and can't do as much? Sad news to report is that Patapouf our rescue Newfoundland from Paris who has been with us for six years,sadly went missing a couple of weeks ago and hasn't returned nor has anyone seen him! He was around 12 years old so a good age for his breed, but it is very quiet without him, those of you who knew him will know what I mean.

Vines around the house have now been attached and work continues on the big field it could be called late but we don't mind as it doesn't produce loads of quantity and its easier for us to see what we are doing.

The late spring has helped us in the sense that the grass and weeds haven't started to grow as quickly as normal but as many of you will know if using chemical weed control this wouldn't be a problem, however, by mechanical means and by hand it is both time consuming and costly and is about to start. An article that a friend has read has got us thinking? somebody has been using sheep to graze between the vines, so if anybody has a couple of spare sheep give us a call and you can have some free grazing.

BOOK NEWS

Many of you who know us well will be aware that Paul Strang, the foremost authority on the wines of the South- West of France has just gained an award for his new book Wines and Winemakers of the south west. For those of you that haven't heard of this man look out for this new book and also his wife's cookery book on the South west Goosefat and Garlic ,a must for anyone who likes the food down here, and who wouldn't!!