Saving Our Skins

by Caro Feely

  Through the project I learnt that aid payments, even once officially granted, are not guaranteed. Each step requires mountains of paperwork. Even once the Is were dotted and the Ts were crossed in triplicate (and sometimes several times more than that), and each version had been signed in original by our accountant, the actual payments were not certain. They were dependent on full compliance with the accessibility and security requirements. I spent hours searching for the correct furniture and measuring 90-centimetre passages, doing everything I could to be sure we were aux normes, but I knew despite the preparation that an unexpected hitch could block us at the last hurdle.

  The second half of the aid, if we ever received the first, would also depend on several thousand euros' more expense to ensure we were aux normes with our spraying machine and treatment of effluent. The EU used aid programmes like the one we had applied for as a carrot to make sure that farmers receiving the aid for projects like a tasting room or accommodation met new environmental standards for seemingly unrelated things like the sprayer and the effluent treatment. The standards for these farming norms were set for large-scale farming and often made no sense when applied to a small farm, especially an organic one. The sprays we used were natural and would cause mild skin irritation at worst, but we still had to meet the norms for the spraying machine required for spraying highly toxic and dangerous chemicals on a large conventional farm.

  One of the rules was adding a second vat to provide clean water for the spraying machine. This was required so that the machine could be rinsed with clean water, and that the water used for the rinsing – now a dilute version of the toxic spray – could be used out in the field where the operator was, rather than bringing the toxic rinse waste back to the farm courtyard. On our small farm, with no toxic sprays and with water butts metres from where Seán finished spraying, it was a joke. But we had to do it and it cost well over a thousand euros. The second part, treating the effluent, or waste, from the winery, was even more of a joke. The only 'effluent' we produced was small quantities of dilute grape juice or wine in water, so good and healthy we used it on our fields as a natural fertiliser. Knowing that the farmer in Gardonne who would not eat his own apples could be aux normes while poisoning the water made it all the more crazy, but we had to do it. I resolved to programme these two necessities as soon as we got the first payment of the aid money.

  Jen Barclay emailed from the publishers to say that the manuscript had been read by several colleagues and appreciated. It was looking hopeful. I dared to believe and felt a rush of excitement in my belly. The advance they would pay me on signing would help the finances. Then, just when I thought we would never see a cent of it, a lump of aid money arrived in our account. There was no notice, no explanation. We were over the moon and so was Monsieur Lambert. He and our other patient suppliers could at last be paid. I felt deeply relieved. We were seeing light at the end of the tunnel. Now I could take Seán's advice to stop working on Sundays and spend some time with my daughters without causing myself a racing heartbeat and insomnia. When I heard Sonia's tyres on the gravel that afternoon around 5 p.m. I went to hug Sophia and Ellie at the door and pointed to their special goûter of banana bread surrounded by fruit cut into shapes to make a face on each of their plates. Their broad smiles filled my heart with joy. I sat down with a cup of tea and we chatted about the day. As we talked I experienced a deep sense of happiness, a profound sense of fulfilment. 'I'm not working this Sunday,' I announced gleefully. 'What would you like to do?' Their eyes went wide with delight. 'Let's do a picnic outside!' said Ellie. 'Let's go shopping for books!' said Sophia.

  I laughed. 'You forget the shops are closed on Sunday in France. But we can go picnicking and take some books with us to read. Imagine: a lovely walk, a delicious picnic, lying down on the picnic blanket looking up at the blue sky, reading… How about it?' 'Yes!' said Ellie pulling her fist down through the air like she had just scored a goal.

  'If you buy me a new book to read,' said Sophia. At a mere eight years old she was a skilled negotiator and debater; all the reading was paying off.

  'I'll get you one when I go shopping tomorrow,' I said.

  'Really, Mommy? Can you get me Ma vie selon moi?' said Sophia, almost unable to believe it possible, we had been living so lean for so long. It was usually the library or nothing.

  'Yes, I'll get it,' I said, knowing it was something she had been hankering after for a while. 'I'll get a new book for Ellie too.'

  'I can't wait,' said Sophia.

  'Me too,' said Ellie.

  'It's a date!' I said happily as I cleared away the plates and my teacup and stacked them into the dishwasher.

  Chapter 25

  A Shocking Death

  Yannick Chenet's face, deformed by poison, stared out of the photo at me. He was communicating from the grave; dead at 43 years of age, officially recognised by the French government as killed by the pesticide he sprayed on his vineyard. One of the jets of his spray machine broke and he was doused in the poison he usually reserved for his grapes. In a few months it was all over.

  One of his last comments was: 'In hospital I discovered that the same company that made the pesticides that were killing me was making the pills they were giving me to fight the cancer. I said, "It can't be true."' But it was. For my newborn social and political awakening it was almost too much to take.

  Reading on, I discovered that more than a quarter of the roughly 220,000 tons of agricultural pesticide used in Europe per year was sprayed on French soil – and 20 per cent of that amount went onto French vineyards, though vineyards accounted for less than 4 per cent of the country's crop surface.

  I was stunned. We never sprayed pesticide on our vines and had experienced no crop loss at all from pest outbreaks. On our farm, natural habitats encouraged good bugs like ladybirds that kept the unwanted bugs, like aphids, in check. Even the Achilles' heel of competition from fellow members of our commune had a silver lining: less than a fifth of our border areas were on chemically farmed vineyards.

  Soon after we moved in I recall seeing the skull and crossbones sign on the cans left by the previous owner. I looked closer and read, 'Do not enter the vineyard for 48 hours after spraying.' Then I hadn't known that much about it, but common sense alone told me that putting something so toxic on food, or in the vicinity of homes and children, made no sense. Grapes are not washed before they are made into wine.

  On conventional farms these pesticides are complemented by a range of herbicides to remove all growth that can be competition to the crop. Two types of herbicide are applied: one to kill the plants that are already growing, usually a glyphosate like Roundup, and then another called a pre-emergent herbicide to stop the seeds from germinating. In this way the only living things left in the vineyards are the vines themselves, ensuring they are the only target for plant-eating pests living or arriving in the area. To fight those pests, the farmer then sprays the highly carcinogenic pesticides, including those so toxic they can kill a grown man like Yannick. The ironic twist in the tail is the third part of the chemical cocktail used by conventional winegrowers: systemic fungicides, applied to kill downy mildew. They are sprayed on and are absorbed by the leaves then go to work on the inside to kill all fungi, including good ones. They are like antibiotics: if you use them non-stop, as some conventional farmers use systemic fungicides, you would weaken your system because the beneficial bacteria that you need to keep your stomach working properly would be dead. They are critical to your health, including the combatting of seemingly unrelated ailments like heart disease.

  Not only do the systemic fungicides stop beautiful wild orchids and delicious truffles from growing, but they also stop the vine's natural access to nutrients offered by their symbiotic relationship with mycorrhiza, essential soil fungi. This weakened access to natural food in the soil means more chemical fertilisers are required to achieve an economic yield. These have mineral salts that make the vine thirsty so it takes up more water and holds more water in
its cells – as we do when we eat too many salty snacks – and this extra water makes them more susceptible to fungal disease, meaning more systemic fungicide is required, and so on in a never-ending vicious circle that ends with a desert instead of a farm.

  Each time I explained this on our vineyard tour, people were dumbstruck. It seemed so illogical to be caught in this cycle – why would anyone be farming with chemicals?

  Bulk farmers are trapped in a low-margin business. Converting to organic takes three years of hardship, what I now call the 'Valley of Despair', the phase I described in my first book. Vines need to go through cold turkey, like someone coming off drugs, and struggle to cope; their immunity is low. They need more care and attention than they will in a few years when their resistance has improved. You have to invest in new equipment and new methods, but can't charge more for your product since you can't mention organic until you are certified. It's a dangerous traverse that many conventional farmers are not in a position to make financially, even if they wanted to.

  I tore myself away from the horror story about Yannick, pulled on my hiking boots and my backpack, slicked on a quick stroke of lipstick and a spray of sunscreen, and grabbed my hiking pole.

  Andrew, a solid, blonde Dorset farmer and his tall, dark-haired, elegant wife Elizabeth had arrived the night before for a vineyard walking tour. This, my favourite activity on our tour menu, offered a challenge as I never knew exactly what level of fitness the group would have. Each of my circuits had a shortcut and an extra loop. For the fit, like this Dorset farmer who did a warm-up of 4 kilometres every morning before I appeared with breakfast, I added extra loops.

  We set off at a good pace and I pointed out dandelion, stinging nettle, horsetail, willow and other plants we use for our biodynamic concoctions as they appeared on the track or in the hedgerows. I started to talk about the benefits of hedgerows and organic farming.

  'You're speaking to the converted,' said Andrew laughing at his pun. 'We converted our dairy farm to organic ten years ago. We actually only went organic because there were cash incentives for conversion – I did it for the money. But now I'm a total convert. I will never go back to conventional farming.'

  'Wow,' I said. 'You sound like Saul on the road to Damascus.'

  'I'm a hard-nosed farmer. It's about the benefits versus the costs. All the products we were buying, the chemical fertilisers and chemical herbicides, and the vet bills, they were totally unnecessary. We were lining the pockets of big agro-chemical companies at the cost of the health of our farm. After a couple of years, when the aid was finished, we made about the same amount of money as before, but looking at the whole farm, the cows, the employees and me, we are happier in the organic system. But seeing all this,' he pointed across the valley back to the Wine Lodge and our vineyards, 'I'm thinking of going into vineyards.' He laughed heartily. He ran a big, successful farm with 2,000 cows and twelve full-time employees; I didn't get the feeling he was going to give that up anytime soon.

  'How come you don't have the vet bills now?' I asked.

  'Our cows are a hardy local breed rather than a super-productive special breed. They're outside all year round and rarely get sick. The cows calve naturally. The super-breeds that produce enormous quantities of milk – a must for a conventional dairy – usually need intervention to calve. Looking back on it, it was a never-ending cycle of intervention. With the drop in organic prices resulting from the financial crisis, considering only litres produced and money made, we're not doing as well as the conventional producers. But there is still no way I would go back to that.'

  With biodiversity and natural farming more labour was required, but it was compensated for by not buying expensive chemicals – and by being alive. I knew what sort of farming Yannick would be practising now if he were still with us.

  Since Poc Poc's sudden demise, the other chickens had been quietly dying of old age; one had settled in the woodshed and gone into the long sleep from which we do not return; another did the same snuggled up against the kitchen door. We felt sad but OK; they were ready.

  An invitation to attend the Best of Wine Tourism awards ceremony at a grand chateau in the Médoc arrived at lunch to lift me out of my gloom about another death in our chicken clan. It was accompanied by a letter asking us to supply bottles of wine for the tasting on the evening of the awards. I felt a flutter of excitement. If we were being asked for wine, perhaps we had won something.

  That same week Jen emailed to say the publisher wanted to go ahead with publication of my book. She sent a draft contract via email and asked me to read it over. Taking a moment to lie in the hammock under the trees, I read through the legalese. Feeling a real publishing contract in my hands and realising I would soon be a published author, I was overwhelmed with joy. The money would be handy but the deal meant so much more to me than that.

  Sébastian and Thomas had pulled out all the stops and kept to our deadlines. With the arrival of summer, the Wine Lodge was officially open for business. The void left by the departure of the team was rapidly filled by guests, but I still felt a gap. After nearly a year of working together it was strange not to have Thomas's stable presence and Sébastian's effervescence constantly on site.

  That Friday the gîte guests left a day early to make their ferry booking so we took the opportunity to test out our new Wine Lodge terrace. Watching the sun set over the vineyards, we ate a delicious barbecue made by Seán. The view up the valley towards Saussignac and across to Gageac was breathtaking: rolling vineyards and forest dotted with stone homesteads, all perfectly touched with the evening's palette of pinks. The girls ran around the deck of the lodge and up onto the terrace of the tasting room, playing hide-and-seek. I opened the tasting-room doors and put on a CD and we danced like sprites.

  Seán had drawn a man-sized triskell onto the rounded wall of the tasting room and Thomas had skilfully

  traced it with a mosaic made from shards of terracotta tiles. The triskell, a three-way spiral, is an ancient Celtic symbol and spirals are often used as symbols for biodynamics, so we had chosen the triskell as our logo to go with the new name Terroir Feely on our bottles. Seeing it on the tasting-room wall that night as we danced, I felt a deep satisfaction. After all the effort and stress, the new tasting room and lodge were a beautiful reality. Our place and our wines were transforming into what we wanted.

  Chapter 26

  Chasse au Trésor Périgord-style

  Isobel, Lucy and Lucy were high-flying twenty-something lawyers from London. Lucy One was training for a walk up Kilimanjaro to take place ten days after the tour with me. It was sure to be another case of adding circuits to my walking routes.

  That autumn I woke up a little earlier than usual so I could go down to the bramble hedge and pick fresh blackberries for breakfast each morning. It was magical, almost meditative, a moment of calm to collect the best berries I had ever tasted.

  A couple of hours after picking blackberries one morning, I started my three days of walking with the three gals from London, passing below the Château de Saussignac where a giant sculpture about 12 foot tall of a hiker striding with a walking cane appeared in the morning mist. Behind him, leaning demurely against a tree, was a stone nude, her pretty face and perfect small breasts pointing in the direction of our path that descended into the valley where I often found the aromas that gave me a clue about the biodynamic day and which elements had the upper hand. When it smelt earthy, it was a root day; when it smelt leafy, the water element was strong; floral aromas meant the air element had the upper hand; and fruity smells meant the fire element was strong.

  Our village of Saussignac was transforming into an artists' haven. Mike Snow, a painter, and Tim White, a photographer, were two Americans that started the trend soon after we arrived. Since then more artists, including Renépaul, the sculptor responsible for these unexpected sculptures, had arrived.

  As we walked through the valley of the aromas I warned the three women to beware of the stinging nettle on t
he side of the path and held out my hand to feel the delicate tickle of the mare's tail fronds that crowded the path's edge, jostling with the nettle for space. I caught a strong smell of leaves and herbs as we crossed the stream and climbed up towards Gageac, then passed into a forested track filled with birdsong. From the shaded woodland we moved back into vineyards on our left and peaceful cream cows on our right. The Charolais cattle watched us walking by, their heads moving in unison like a dance troupe in slow motion. At the top of the hill we stopped for a short break to take in the views. The sky was cloudy with pinky tints where the sun was trying to break through. Looking back towards Saussignac we could see the perfect front face of her chateau; and to our right, the Château de Gageac-Rouillac, older than Saussignac even. Dating back to the 900s, its left tower was the oldest donjon, keep, in the entire Dordogne department. The crenellated chateau surrounded by a moat could have modelled for a fairy tale. Between the two chateaux, and directly in front of where we sat drinking in elderflower cordial and the view itself, plunged the Dordogne valley. It was a mix of picturesque vineyards, forests, stone hamlets with church spires, and the river. This was one of my favourite spots, a place I often brought Dora running.