We seem to have had a few incidents whilst we lived in the beautiful old Presbytere of St. Vincent.
We had not been there long before we started having the swimming pool put in. The problem as with most Presbyteres is they do not have land, what Priest had time to garden? We did have a square walled garden area just big enough to fit in the pool and have a small lawn. The problem was a huge straggly tree was just outside the wall overhanging the whole of the garden. There was little light and the pool would constantly be full of leaves. We discovered the land the tree was on belonged to our neighbours at the Chateau as did all the fields round about. We had a word with the son of the chateau and he was in agreement to us having it cut down. All simple enough till the woodcutter arrived. The handicapped neighbours in the school house were slowly getting used to the fact that they had difficult-to-understand foreigners living next to them (they were supporters of Jean Marie Le Pen) and they came out to see what we were daring to do.
As the woodcutter started to unload his tools, the neighbours said we could not cut the tree down and we had no rights to despoil their French countryside. We explained we had permission but they were not happy and went to phone the Mayor. When the Mayor's adjoint came, they said the land the tree was on was communal, so once again the job was on hold whilst plans were checked in the Mairie. Once it was established the land did belong to the chateau, the neighbours did not believe we had permission. Fortunately Madame in a confused state arrived to give me a big cuddle and when I explained what was happening she in no uncertain terms gave the neighbours a piece of her mind and commanded the woodcutter to chop down the tree " tout de suite"
I then took Madame home for a nice coffee and biscuit and another big hug.
Reading this you may have some sympathies with the ''not cutting tree down brigade'' but had it been a specially planted tree rather than an eye sore straggling horror growing through our wall, I would agree.
Pertaining to this story
On French "gardeners' question time" this morning, they were talking about rights to cutting down trees or branches next to your property. Apparently if a neighbours tree branches or roots hang over or run under your garden you can only cut them down with the owner's permission and then you must give the wood from the branches back to them
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