The ducks back!
As I promised before Christmas I will this weekend (28/29TH Jan) start to publish the air and water temperatures every week here at Bletiere. You can follow it here.
I know a lot of anglers found it useful to see what the weather was doing here in France and it also gives you a guide to how close to potential spawning we are as you follow the rise in temperature. At least it will give you a rough idea if the carp are likely to start spawning near your visit.
I have taken a look at last years on the forum as its still there.
I started it in February and it was 6 degrees air and 8 degrees in the lake. Today it is 9 degrees in the air and 10 degrees in the lake so a big difference.
As long as we do not get the usual cold weather in February it’s looking good as it will get the fish feeding with the warmer weather we get in March, and hopefully for any lucky anglers taking advantage of our early fishing offers they will get off to a good start.
Tight lines, John
La Bletiere
A rare Ripsaw Niger Catfish
TopCats , Thailand, is home to over 26 species fish and one lucky customer had a shock when his bait was picked up by our Niger Catfish. The take was slow and steady but once the hook was set it ripped off like a torpedeo! The lucky man was Joe from USA. Well done and good luck next time for another rare one.
It’s official.
2011 was the hottest year in France since 1900, beating previous record holder 2003. The average temperature of 13.6 degrees C was 1.5 degrees higher than ‘usual’. This resulted from a warm spring and a warm autumn. Summer was actually quite disappointing with July being colder than normal.
The warm weather has continued into winter. This is the first in the six winters we’ve spent here when the lakes haven’t frozen over before Christmas. We’ve had practically no snow and that’s very unusual too. A couple of daffodils have even poked their heads out of the ground, three months earlier than in previous years.
Is this a sign of climate change, or just a natural variation? It’s too early to tell yet, but two hottest ever years within eight years of each other could be indicative of generally climbing temperatures. We’ll have to see what happens over the next decade.
The warm year meant that crops ripened early and many plants produced another flush of flowers. A lot of wild birds and animals managed to squeeze in an extra brood of babies. Our swallows had three sets of youngsters this year. That’s amazing, considering that in May 2009 ago most of them were killed by the blizzard in May. Maybe it’s Nature’s way of redressing the balance.
The hottest ever recorded temperature in France was 44 degrees C in Toulouse in 1923, while the coldest is -31 degrees in Chamonix in 1905.
(Worldwide records are 58 degrees in Libya in 1922 and -89 degrees in the Antarctic in 1938.)
There are generally reckoned to be seven climate zones in France and they’re shown nice and clearly on this map. LINK:
http://www.meteorologic.net/climat-francais.php
The zones are:
- Climat Océanique
- Climat Semi-Océanique
- Climat Méditerranéen
- Climat Semi-Méditerranéen
- Climat Continental
- Climat Semi-Continental
- Climat Montagnard
Generally, the océanique and semi-océanique zones are wet and fairly mild, the continental and semi-continental have hot summers and cold winters, the méditerranéen and semi-méditerranéen have hot summers and warm winters, and the mountain zone, well, that’s techncially imprévisible i.e. it will do what it wants! However, you tend to get a lot snow in winter.
Here in Creuse we fall into the Climat Semi-Continental zone, but this year so far haven’t had the usual brutally cold hiver that we’d expect.
But there’s still two months of winter to come and that could all change …
Lac du Val ‘s final stock fish have just been put in our stock pond ready for March / April movement into the main lake.
These 36 beautiful mirrors arrived on Saturday 14th Jan and are hand picked fish farm stock.
The largest was 37lb 8oz and the smallest 27lb 7oz and all lovely fat fish in fantastic condition. So this brings the total to 52 new carp for 2012.
I’m hoping the first lads on will help with the netting of the stock pond to rehome them into the main lake.
Regards, David & Sammy
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