Monthly Archives: April 2011

Tonight we are making the final preparations for the honeybees. We pick them up at 2:00 tomorrow and bring them to their new red home. I just finished cooking the sugar syrup to feed them, and I’m anxiously reading and re-reading the chapter on “opening up your package of bees.” Hopefully it will be nice and sunny tomorrow and they will adjust well to their new home beneath the ancient plum trees. I think we picked a good site: south-facing, out of prevailing wind, full sun in the morning, dappled sun in the afternoon, on a bit of a hill (as much as we have here). Out of major foot- and equipment-traffic. And, away from the hedgerow edges of the farm where we border the Chemical Brothers.

Lillibet is keeping Della company while she paints the new cow barn.

It was a beautiful, sunny weekend. The kids had fun painting the cow barn. Then Cosmo took the rest of the day off to be one with the earth. 

It's important to take your boots off to play in a dirt hole.

We’re nearly ready to get the cows moved into the new barn and get the chickens moved into the big greenhouse for some hay-scratching and cowpie-busting. I’ve got a load of broccoli and lettuce plants to get into the well-fertilized ex-chicken greenhouse. Mike picked up covers for the caterpillar tunnels today, so that will be tomorrow’s project. After the bees.

We’ll ignore that weather forecaster mention about the coldest spring in 80 years. But it does make me wonder if the last ice age crept up over several decades or centuries, or did it just appear suddenly?

Finally, finally we got some planting done outside. Mike plowed on Friday, then waited for the ground to dry a little. Saturday he got it disced, but it was still sticky. Once it is opened up after all the pounding rain, though, it dries pretty quickly. Monday he hustled out with the tractor and tiller and got a patch ready for the low tunnels. Monday night he had it planted in spinach, radishes, and a bunch of salad greens. Tonight they are all ready for a little water and a plastic cover to convince them that it really is spring. Hopefully we’ll be picking the beginning of May.

The sun came out and I got the bee boxes painted. All ready to set up for the honeybees!

I got the beehives painted and the suit arrived Monday. My 3# package of workers and one queen will arrive around the 20th. Then the beekeeping adventure begins!

Tuesday we’re hoping to get a bigger space tilled and planted, this time with fava beans, peas, and even more greens. These should end up for late May/June harvest. Fingers crossed for one more day of sun!

COMING SOON:
Swiss Chard
Loose Cabbages
Japanese Turnips

The greens sure are lovely this time of year! We hope you’re enjoying their fresh flavors. Greenhouse 1 is starting to fill up with flats of transplants. Luis has turned 150 pieces of electrical conduit into mini-greenhouse hoops. Now, if it would just dry up for a day or two so we can plant outside. These little tunnels should end up about 4 feet tall and 6 feet wide and 100 feet long. Room for 4-5 rows of crop. We’re planning on putting radishes, spinach, arugula, green onions, and Yokatta-na inside them. We can’t wait!

Steel tunnel hoops waiting for their lot in life.