We recently inherited another ten chickens from our friend who moved a couple weeks ago.  Along with the Buckeye and Barred Rock laying hens were four Buckeye roosters.  As I helped Stu unload them from the back of his truck I was a little nervous; we're on pretty good terms with our neighbors and we'd really prefer to keep it that way.  I stood there at the fence after he left, watching the dynamics of the flock to be sure there wasn't going to be any huge fights, especially with the roosters.  They are still young enough that they haven't developed their spurs so they can't do as much damage.  Things settled down fairly quickly after some dueling here and there with some of the larger Australorp hens and the roosters.  I'm hoping that we'll be able to keep one or two of the roosters so we can replenish our flock, but we'll have to wait and see how noisey they are once they settle in.  It seems like they're doing their job, though, because for the past few days one of the Australorps has been happy to stay in one of the nesting boxes.

The goats are doing well.  Juniper's leg healed fantastically and she's gotten to where she doesn't have a limp and can run and jump just as well as the other two girls.  I feel a small sense of accomplishment with that.  Our attempts at milking Chutney were a bust.  Between her unwillingness to stand still and the small size of her teats due to being a first freshener made it infuriatingly difficult to get much milk.  We've been considering investing in a larger goat that would be easier for us both (especially Kyle since he has larger hands) to milk.  But we'll see how that goes.

The second swarm that stopped by one of our trees left last weekend.  Kyle had just finished building the top bar hive and we placed it under the swarm.  It was getting late in the day and we were both exhausted, so we thought we'd give them the night and the next morning to think about checking out the hive on their own before trying to drop them into the box.  The next morning we awoke and found that they had left.  Our own hive is doing well, though, we're ready to take a few frames out to harvest a bit of honey.  Kyle is hoping it will help with his allergies- the poor guy has been congested for weeks.

Finally, our garden.  I was so excited about the garden this year; I was so determined to make it a success.  Well, my friends, you know the saying about good intentions, right?  Unfortunately we've met some difficulty here as well.  We went down to the garden last week to find something had chewed the stalks of our tomato plants that had been doing so well.  They were lost.  Not only that, the black beans are being systematically attacked by something as well.  They were looking great a few weeks ago, but I checked them one day to find a patch of the bed had been demolished, then a few days later, more plants were gone.  I'm not sure what we'll be left with, but I'm not holding out much hope.

The few plants that appear to be doing amazingly well are our summer squash, carrots, beets, and potatoes.  Of course, its hard to say what is going on underneath the potato plants, but I can only hope they are doing well.  Hopefully we'll have enough to save for seed potatos for next year.  Seeing our difficulty with this garden for the second year in a row, we've decided to re-evaluate our garden plans.  Being such non-green-thumbs, why did we decide to take on such a large plot?  Well, because it is there and we were determined to make it work.  Under other circumstances, perhaps if we didn't have the goats, chickens, house renovations, full time jobs, and a multitude of other things, we could have pushed through and made our garden a success.  But, we're too new at this and it was just unrealistic for us.

So, next year we're going to do a smaller garden.  Smaller, but happier.  We're considering moving it up to be right next to the house, on our small, south-facing lawn.  There, not only would it be potentially safer from critters (because the dogs are up there more often), but it is closer to the spigot so we don't have to drag five hoses all the way down the hill and back to water it when necessary.  But my favorite reason for moving it is that we'd be able to see it easily from our picture window.  When things are ripe we'll know sooner so we can grab them and we'd be more apt to weed more often if we see it every day.  So we'll start small and once we get the hang of that, we'll add another bed or two, and so on until we get to where we want to be.

So thats the plan my friends.  Just because things aren't going well doesn't mean we throw in the towel, we take a step back and see what we're doing wrong and what we can do to improve.  We'll get there.  Rome wasn't built in a day, right?  It takes time.  We'll get there.

Wowzers.  A few weekends ago, Kyle and I got home from a neighbor's funeral to find a mass of bees flying around the truck.  I was immediately concerned that it was our bees so suited up to check on our hive.  After checking a few frames and being satisfied with what I found on my hive inspection I went back up to the house to enjoy the show.  The sound of tens of thousands of bees flying through the air was amazing.

After just a few more minutes the chaos of flying bees quickly turned into a solid mass that had attached itself to a couple branches in one of the trees next to our house.  I stared up at them and wished that they had landed on a lower branch where we might have been able to transfer them to a second hive (not that we currently HAVE a second hive...but I had plans to whip up a quick Top Bar Hive).  I mean, FREE BEES people!  Seriously!  How could I pass this up?

After a few days of trying to convince Kyle to build this new hive for me he finally began.  The main box was mostly finished, we just needed the top bars for the bees to build their comb on.  Well, the day after this first part was completed the bees had left.  They had found a suitable new home somewhere and were nowhere to be found.  I was seriously bummed.

But last night, Kyle went out to play with Ollie in the back yard and came back into the house to say that there was another swarm of bees in the yard.  This time they are on a smaller tree, and quite low to the ground.  I didn't get a chance to get down there to check it out, but I'm hoping they'll stick around for a few days to allow us time to try to finish the hive.  Then, perhaps I will try to physically move them to their new home.

What the heck happened to the first half of July!?  We're in the final two weeks of this month and we're getting perilously close to August, the month of school supplies and talk of fall.  Thinking back to what we've done so far this summer, I'm a little sad to say that we've only been out in the kayaks a handful of times, hiked even less, and have yet to pull my bikes out of the work shop.  It always amazes me how quickly time flies, and yes, I'll agree that it gets faster with each year.

But, fall is a great time of year in Vermont.  At least until stick season when everything just looks too bare for comfort.  So there is still plenty of time to get out in those boats, and on the trails, and maybe even wear down some tires as well.  Winter seems to take its time getting here, it hangs on for sure, but real snow fall doesn't show its face usually until January.  Sure it'll be freezing and bitter, and I'll long for Spring to come, but this year we'll have our woodstove.  There's nothing quite like the dry heat that radiates from the belly of a cast iron and hearthstone beast, and I'll smile at its flickering glow each night.

But lets not get to ahead of ourselves, right?  After all, summer is barely a month old now and I'm certainly not showing it the door.  Over the weekend we harvested some lovely little beets and planted a new crop of peas, carrots, and salad greens.  The garden hadn't been touched in (dare I say it?) at least a month and a half and lets just say it didn't look like much of a garden.  My Mom came down to help give me a boost and we tackled it all amazingly enough, and not too soon either because the next day it rained.  The garden is looking lovely again.

The bees have been enoying their 'front porch', as Kyle calls it, lately with all this heat.  Most days when I come home from work there are a fair few out on the front of the hive, cooling off.  I need to get in there and check on the honey stores and the brood to be sure all is well.  Its just so hard to 'suit up' with the sweltering heat, hopefully now with the temperatures regulating again I'll be able to bring myself to get out there.

Things around the farm have been going well.  The absence of the pigs has been felt mostly during feeding time, when the familiar sounds of oinks, grunts, and squeels are decidedly absent.  Juniper's leg has been healing over the past few weeks in her splint.  I'm going to take it off this weekend and see how she does walking without it.  We may set up Ollie's old dog crate for her to stay in to keep the other girls from jostling her around too much during the first couple days.  And of course, the chickens are doing well, they come and go as they please and lately have been spending the early morning hanging out in front of our porch hoping for an early breakfast.  One was at the front door this morning, clucking at me through an open window.

Last night I took some down time in our hammock, with Juniper and Poppy on my lap, while Kyle brought the bigger girls down the rock face to the taller brush in our lower field.  There was something so calming about swaying under the canopies of three giant maple trees with two tiny ruminants chewing their cud, their eyes barely staying open.  Sometimes it dawns on me what my life has come to mean and I am humbled by it.

Well folks.  Its been a while since I've had to admit to doing something truly idiotic.  At least...as far as I can recall.

Today started out to be pretty normal.  We fed the animals and even set up our new movable electric fence that came in the mail yesterday.  So the goats and the chickens have been enjoying a little bit of exta special grazing/browsing which I think they are really enjoying.  We're finally going to be able to move the pigs out of their pasture, into a new spot where they can help us dig up all the pricker bushes while we grow pig food in their old pasture.

Kyle took off around 8 this morning to go help his sister do some demolition in her house in preparation of a new addition and I started getting another batch of syrup ready to refill the bee's feeder.  While I was waiting for it to cool down I spent some quality time over with the girls.  Chutney is just so ready to pop.  I'm glad she's only going to have to wait another two weeks or so because the poor girl is just so uncomfortable.

After a while I tested the syrup and the temperature felt good so I grabbed my beekeeping equipment and headed down the hill with the pot of syrup.  All was pretty quiet at the hive and I slowly donned my veil and gloves.  I removed the cover and pulled out the bucket that holds the syrup and started checking things out.  They're making good headway with the comb-building.  Had I brought down the smoker, I would have loved to take a better look at everything but it's tough to really handle a piece of wood covered in bees when they just really don't want to let go.  So I figured I'd leave that for another day.

I set the inner cover back on followed by the feeder.  Once the top was on and the buzzing subsided I stepped back and enjoyed myself.  I couldn't help but think how relatively easy this was going so far.  Thats about where my brain stopped working.  Much to my dismay I realized that, once again, I had forgotten to tuck my pant legs into my boots!  While the first couple times I did this it didn't prove to be a problem, this time was certainly not the case.  Sure enough I had a bee crawling up my leg.  This is where I lost all ability to reason and think like an educated person whatsoever.

I tried in vain to keep calm and resisted the urge to strip off my pants then and there.  While, sure, I had underwear on, I live here and I don't really need to have everyone and their brother (possibly even coworkers, bosses, you use your imagination) see me in my tighty whities!  I quickly untucked my shirt, unzipped my pants, and willed the (undoubtedly confused) little creature out.  But I couldn't see a damned thing with my veil on (see where this is going?) so I carefully inched myself a few more feet away from the hive (still pretty freaking close, though) and quickly pulled off the veil.

I don't think I had it off for 2 seconds before I realized that I had a mob of bees hovering around me.  And bees, being the curious creatures that they are, like to check things out.  SO one landed on me.  Not just anywhere, either.  The poor thing landed on my chin- I freaked- she freaked- I tried to carefully brush her off (which probably wasn't quite as slow, calm, and careful as it should have been) and she stung.  Of course my first reaction was to get the stinger out and, as I'm thinking of how I'm supposed to scrape it out of my skin instead of pinching it which would release the venom, I pinch the freaking thing.  Yep.  I am a college graduate, and a beekeeping moron.

So here I am, pants unzipped, jacket off, veil on the ground, probably not even ten feet away from the hive and I've got a bee sting on my face.  It hurts, nothing unbearable, mostly just a numb stinging feeling (no duh, right?) so I decide I should get up to the house to get some benadryl cream and check things out.  I take stock, can't feel the bee in my pants anymore (thank god) and slowly walk up the house.  I get on the porch and hear this frantic buzzing noise.  Sure enough, thanks to my brilliant revelation to take my veil off to see the freaking bee in my pants, I got a bee stuck in my ponytail.

So I sit down on the porch and put my head between my knees in an effort to keep my hair off my neck where this poor bee could just decide to call it quits and sting me, too.  It took something like five minutes of strategic jacket placement to get the bee something to hold on to in order to free itself.  As soon as I could tell it was released I looked back to be sure it was free from my jacket and fled into the house where I quickly applied the benadryl and admired my very first sting as a beekeeper.

I mean, sure I was kicking myself in the butt for being so irrational, but I guess I'm glad I got the first one overwith.  And I can guarantee  that I won't be forgetting to tuck my pantlegs into my boots anymore!

Hey folks.  Sorry for this long-delayed post.  Things at work (aka my full time job away from the homestead) have kept me pretty darned busy.  But, I'm back and I just can't wait to tell you how the bee installation went on Monday!

Hey folks!

I apologize for my prolonged absence.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, I was off on a business trip to Texas/Mexico for the week.  But, happily, I am back home and seriously happy that I missed out on the snow that stopped by our house while I was away.  We are getting a head-start on the 'April showers' here and I'm just hoping that our spring flowers, that really got going over the past month, are going to tolerate the weather alright.  Here's a quick update on the farm happenings:

I got an email from our hatchery last week that our order of chicks will be shipping out on the 31st, this Wednesday.  So we'll have eighty chicks peeping away come the end of the week.  I'm definitely looking forward to their arrival but its always a little difficult when we work full-time jobs as well.  I work from 7-3:30 so we get the call from the post office right as I'm getting to work- so Kyle will, most likely, have to deal with them himself.  This isn't usually too bad, but when there are so many and you have to dip all their beaks in water to teach them to drink, it takes some time.

Our bees will be ready for pick up in two weeks- April 12th.  I'm excited to get that new aspect of the farm going.  I'm hoping that they'll thrive and not have any health problems like we've been seeing all over.  Nothing to do but wait and see I suppose.

I swear the pigs have doubled in size since we bought them.  Brick Top is still the biggest and the BOSS over the other boys, Freddy has become quite friendly and I think Kyle and I are going to have an extra-difficult time sending him off to the butcher when his time comes.  We're really excited about the landscaping they've been doing in their pasture and we're looking forward to sectioning it off so we can plant some quick-growing vegetables for them for later this spring/summer.  Their tilling speed and power have really got us planning away at future gardening endeavors on the rest of our land.  Eventually we're going to start fencing off the rest of the land so we can do rotational grazing/gardening a little easier in the future.

Finally, the goats are still working away at growing their babies.  May is finally starting to look a little rounder in the mid-section, so I'm feeling fairly confident that her 'date' was successful.  Chutney is so big I can't even pick her up anymore without fear of throwing out my back.  And she's actually started making her udder.  It is measly right now, but I suppose that is to be expected as she doesn't need it for another month and a half.  I'm sure in the weeks to come she'll really kick it into high gear.  Her mother is still milking after giving birth to Chutney, so I'm confident about her dairy genes.

Exciting stuff.