Another lovely weekend -perfect for a stroll in the  Dordogne countryside. This week we started our 8.5km easy amble at Saint Crepin, just a 15 minute drive from Les Crouquets.

Not long after we set off we met a gaggle of turkeys on the road ( well, only 3 actually, but they were making enough noise to constitute a gaggle!). I was amazed at the speed they could move at, almost as if they were still trying to avoid becoming last year’s Christmas dinner – not that they would fit in your average oven- they were HUGE!!

Further on we came across a very picturesque hamlet , a group of old buildings dating back to the 17th century. All the roofs were meticulously restored with the original roof covering of the region – lauze. These aren’t tiles but huge overlapping blocks of stone. They are extremely heavy & difficult to work with and they add an enormous weight to the building. Amar once helped a friend repair his lauze roof and he & his head (often bumped & scraped due to working with heavy stones in cramped conditions!)  can testify to how labour intensive it is.

 I often see roofs round here with a small section of lauze at the bottom and the rest recovered in terracotta tiles, understandable I suppose but sad at the same time knowing that this unique craftsmanship is fast becoming a dying art. Part of the charm in living here is that I often imagine I’m part of another era . You can almost feel how people used to live – a welcome change from our past busy & stressful lives.

St Crépin  & Carlucet are listed as being among the most picturesque villages in the Perigord & it’s easy to see why.

Definitely worth a visit!

Happy New Year!!

I was a bit later than usual opening up the henhouse on New Year’s Day ( our celebrations went on long into the night!!) and found them all sitting in a line at the top of the house, eager to get out. As I watched them run out stretching their wings and clucking enthusiastically I wondered how many of Europe’s battery hens were enjoying their extra 200cm2 of cage space as a result of the new EU legislation.

Happy hens!

From 1st January 2012 the new law states that all battery cages, which up until now have allowed each bird a space less than the size of an A4 piece of paper in a sloping wire bottomed cage, must be replace by “enriched” cages, which allow 750 cm2 of wired floor space per bird as well as nesting & perching areas and litter to scratch in.

In effect, not including the nesting areas which can be shared by up to 100 birds, the extra space amounts to not much more than the size of an average Christmas card. Hardly a big improvement but a step in the right direction I suppose, given that  at least being able to walk around a bit must be better than not at all.

But there’s still a long long way to go. Although having had 12 years to prepare for it many countries still aren’t compliant & probably won’t be for many years to come.

In contrast our little flock have the luxury of a whopping 611,111cm2 each and a henhouse with straw filled nesting boxes,a sawdust covered floor, perches at all different heights & ladders to climb up.

Admittedly, we aren’t exactly producing for Carrefour but still… it makes you think.

We can all do our bit to help though by refusing to buy eggs from caged hens, enriched or otherwise. When we occasionally have to supplement our little supply of eggs , we only ever buy those labelled with code 0 ( organic) or 1 ( free range). Code 2 are barn eggs from hens which are housed in large sheds with room to scratch, perch & dust-bathe but no permanent access to outside & code 3 eggs are from caged hens – there isn’t a separate code for eggs from enriched cages.

This year we’re planning to add a few more hens to our flock so that guests can buy fresh eggs straight from the henhouse.

freshly laid eggs

Of course it won’t change overnight, & just swapping over to free range eggs won’t be enough….what about all the things we eat which contain processed eggs – powdered or in liquid form?  Or going a bit further, what about the chickens we eat? What kind of life have they led?

But it’s a start and hopefully somewhere down the line the cages which cause these birds to suffer & endure such an unnatural lifestyle will become as rare as hens’ teeth.