Bordeaux 2016 Primeurs: Médoc
The last time I saw one, I was standing on an embankment by the main riverside road in Chinon, overlooking the waters of the Vienne. A slick black shadow, it glided effortlessly across the river’s gentle flow, cutting through the water as a hot knife slips through butter. My companion for the evening, a dead ringer for Pamela Anderson, stopped to observe the creature.
“Is it an otter?”
When it comes to identifying wild flora and fauna, I have limited experience to fall back on. Living in the Scottish Lowlands I have walked beneath the swoop of kestrels, buzzards and bats, and met badgers, weasels, deer and more. One meeting with a deer was particularly memorable, for all the wrong reasons, as I hit it at 60 mph. But on this occasion I would have been stumped, were it not for my experiences in Bordeaux, as I first spotted this particular species scurrying around in the grounds of Château Belgrave. The many freshwater drainage ditches that criss-cross the Médoc peninsula make this part of France an ideal habitat for this alien invader.
“It’s a ragondin, or outside France they’re known as coypu. They’re South American, and were imported and farmed in France for their fur in the late-19th century. Then some escaped, and you see them everywhere now.”
It was a magic moment, my flash of University-Challenge-level knowledge lifting me above the rank of stupid for just instant. I was an academic David Hasselhoff, running the banks of the Vienne in my red speedos, throwing lifesavers to swimmers in peril while nonchalantly throwing out nuggets of information concerning the lifecycle of the ragondin to those taking the evening air with a stroll along the embankment. My companion’s doppelganger status had obviously influenced my thoughts.
Memories of that evening came back to me as I stood in the garden of Château Preuillac, in the heart of the Médoc appellation, at the crack of dawn, one day during the 2016 Bordeaux primeurs. A ragondin lay almost motionless on the surface of the pond, drifting ever-so-slightly, its silhouette like that of a miniature crocodile stalking its prey. Well that’s how it looked, even if they are herbivorous (see, I just can’t help myself with these ragondin factoids). This one probably had his oeil on a particularly tasty patch of geraniums.
