Malacology madness

Our Finca has a snail population of millions, therefore we have a sufficiency  of snails you might say. This is despite the best efforts of the birds who daily seem to devour hundreds of the smaller snails, and those of our neighbours who select the larger and therefore possibly juicier examples of those molluscs,  which they pick from the Fennel plants around our land.

The numbers of the snail population on Finca Carolina remains pretty constant at too many.

Last year Carol performed jury service in the UK, with a French Guy who had entertained his fellow jurors with an explanation of the lengthy process of cleaning snails prior to their cooking. Charming though the Frenchman was, nobody it seems was at all convinced by the snails gourmet  status. And I have to say that for us L'Escargot remains a popular racehorse and snails are off the menu.

This years wonder cosmetics for ladies are being derived from the secreted mucus of the snail. Advertisers claim that their rather expensive products harness the natural healing properties of  'El Caracol', which is able to regrow a damaged shell, to promote healthy human skin. 

A Spanish friend is a snail farmer, and he recently used our lap top to research the market for current prices for his livestock, 'Compra/venta caracol'. He said that until recently the price of snails was not too good but now that the cosmetics industry had taken an interest in snails the prices had rocketed.

  

Fancy a Facial dear?

Meet Brian, Brian the snail that is. 

He (or Her for they are hermaphrodites) and I met whilst I was cleaning the windows on the first floor of the villa. As I was polishing the inside of the glass he was leaving his snail trails on the outside of the same window. It was whilst contemplating how best to dispatch the pest, I considered the possibility of adding El Caracol to one of Carol's many pots of, lasts years much hyped miracle cosmetics (purely in the interests of science). But having considered that her sense of humour was a little fragile in such matters and that my end might be messier than the snail's; I elected to drop kick Brian the mollusc far into the woods where he may live happily ever after.  As long as he doesn't return I'm happy.

Though if snail prices go up any more I may have to go and find him.

Farming Malarkey

This Farming Malarkey is not as easy as it appears.

Chances of a fig from Figueres are looking quite slim at the moment, with little evidence of fruit having formed on our lone fig tree. The tree looks healthy enough and has good leaf coverage after the late winter rainfall. I enjoy the figs direct from the tree for the freshest of tastes or served with the Iberian ham of Spain’s signature dish. Carol prefers dried figs and lunches on them almost daily with Fazia her friend and fellow fruit-bat. We dried out the figs produced in 2005 and 2006 using a combination of sunshine and the low heat of an oven. In the short term the jammy dried figs were a success but they did not store well.

Pruning carried out by us and as advised by our Moroccan tiler friend was light and should not have damaged the fruit production; further pruning as performed by Francisco’s sheep has only refined the shape of the fig. It is I suppose possible that the previous year’s drought has stopped this year’s fruit from developing on the fig tree. On a positive note there are tiny fruit buds that have set and will go on to produce next season’s fruit. The abundance of fig leaves means that we will have to seek out recipes which use those leaves. Any leaves that remain could be supplied to the naturists who cavort upon the Costa Brava beaches.

Our solitary almond tree survived the drought despite some pillock having excavated the embankment on which it stands. The guy who sold us the house had dumped his manure pile on the embankment, and somebody had dug out the stash whilst we were away from the property. The tree had only four nuts this year but a crop is a crop is it not? Now though that crop has been decimated by either weather or predator and only half the nuts remain.

The pomegranate tree we planted two years ago is flowering again but alas it has not provided us with any fruit to date. Last year I struck half a dozen cuttings from the original tree and although they are now thriving they are not yet flowering. As they mature and flower cross pollination should ensure a healthy crop.

The olive cuttings are now established young plants though their shapes are wildly different. One is almost a standard whilst the others savaged by the severe weather are shrubbier. Pruning should sort out the shapes and we will try to propagate the material we have to remove. Who knows in a thousand years or so they may all be beautiful old trees.

Wolf spider killer on the loose.

This fearsome looking creature is a Wolf spider, and at 2" in length it a formidable night hunter.

Non poisonous though it's bite can cause allergic reaction, this spider will enter the home in cold weather. It does not spin a web and is best dealt with be ushering it outdoors where it can hunt other garden pests to it's hearts content.