A BUSY BEE WEEKEND.
This past Sunday, Jesse and I suddenly realized that if we were going to move our beehives to Bugtussle - we had to do it NOW. As in....on Monday. The weather seemed right, and I wanted to make sure they had some forage available in their new home before the winter set in. We scrambled to prepare, buying some ratchet ties and duct tape and other such securing devices, and we went to work. I spent all day Sunday working in the hives, removing the top super, harvesting the honey, and closing off the top entrance of the hivewith some fine wire mesh.I wasn't planning on harvesting any honey this year. I wanted to make sure these ladies had plenty of food stored away for their first winter. But. They hadn't been all that productive in the latest supers that I added. One extra, kind of empty box on the hives = just more space for them to have to heat throughout the winter. PLUS - one extra level on the hives just made them that much more difficult to move. So, a honey harvest we had! It was a small amount, all in all, probably a half gallon all together. BUT IT IS SO MAGICAL! Cutting into the comb and watching the delicious golden honey pour out into the jar below, I fell in love with bees all over again.
After the harvest, on Sunday night, I closed up the hives (by plugging the entrance with a t-shirt - very fancy) and Jesse helped me load them into the truck. We secured them as best we could, and we headed out on the 3 hour journey to Bugtussle at 5 AM the next morning.To make a long story short, it didn't go great. The bees escaped during the drive. It was pouring down rain at the moment we decided to unload the hives. I got stung in the butt. STILL - it could have been so much worse. After we placed the hives in their new home, the sun came out and we watched them take some orientation flights, getting their bearings and seeing Bugtussle for the first time. It makes me excited for our move very soon - when we can know, after a very stressful year, that we are DONE - we are in our FOREVER HOME and that our new life is just beginning.- Hannah.
STING.
So I got stung on the eyelid yesterday...
Hannah was cutting my hair by the pear tree and we must have been in its flight path. The bee got tangled in Hannah's hair then, frustrated and frantic, attacked me. I had no idea if it stung me or not for a few seconds, but had Hannah look at my eyelid and check for the stinger. And there it was, pumping vigorously.Hannah could probably better explain it, but when a bee stings you it loses its stinger and that stinger is a muscle that continues to pump poison until it runs out or you remove it. I would have liked to have seen this in action, as Hannah said it was pretty amazing, but it was too painful to leave it in until I could find a mirror. I'll be honest, I cussed a little.However, it didn't make yesterday all bad. We shared a delicious breakfast in the morning with our friend Jamie from sustainablekentucky.com who later posted my next fermentation article on Kombucha. We also dug the rest of our sweet potatoes out from under their frosted vines and got them curing. We don't have a particularly warm place to put them so we're pulling my truck into the sun during the day, and loading the cab with the baskets. Then at night, since it's been dipping below 40 degrees already (!), we haul them back inside. Anything to get them to a point in which we can dig in! I miss few things quite like I miss sweet potatoes. Two more weeks...- Jesse.
UPDATES: THE FALL SHARE & THE CAT.
Sorry for the lack of farm or garden related updates lately....but that is pretty much how it goes around here. Aside from being in limbo - this time of year simply doesn't require as much work up in the field. So, you will just have to make do with an update on the Gladdie cattie. She is still a tiny, sickly thing, but it has all been worth it because she has turned out to be an excellent mouser.
Speaking of the neglected garden, our very last main-season CSA delivery is this week! Hard to believe it has been 15 weeks already! We still have garden full of food...but as much as we would love to announce our FALL SHARE, we just don't feel confident enough in our situation. It is still unclear when we will have to be gone from our house/garden, so until we do know for sure - we are going to be selling food week-to-week. If you think you will be interested in getting a CSA basket of food in the near future and live in the Versailles/Danville/Lexington-ish area, make sure you are part of the mailing list! (You can sign up using the link at the bottom of this post or email us at roughdraftfarmstead@gmail.com) We will send out a message each week with the harvest and deliver on a first-come-first-serve basis. It is not ideal, but we are hoping this allows us to continue to feed our friends and family and make the most out of our beloved garden.- Hannah.
LAYERS.
Every three or four days we pull the posts up, drag the chicken wire fence to another spot, and set up new paddock for the chickens. Then we push the chicken coop in and the next day we let them out into a fresh space.Rotation, we learned at Bugtussle, is the best way to manage almost any animal system: lowering impact, spreading out fertility, and keeping the animals healthier.So last night, when the chickens had all put themselves to bed for the evening, Hannah and I went out and started taking down their portable fence when we noticed a little white egg on the ground, then another, and a third in the nest box itself. Pullet eggs! Our first! And since we only have a few birds who will be laying white eggs––the Leghorns––we know who won the race! We had noticed their combs becoming bright red, which Hannah read was a sign they're about to start laying, and sure enough, we're going to be eating some eggs this morning.Anyone who has ever had chickens can attest to the excitement you enjoy in harvesting your first eggs, even if they're roughly half the size of what they will be. You pamper the birds for months, checking daily to see if they've left you any sustenance, and just before you give up on them entirely you find three white eggs. But that makes complete sense, too: if there's anything we've learned in this business it's that you move a bunch of heavy stuff around and at the end of the day, somehow, as if by magic, food happens.- Jesse.