Time to get physical
I have finally gotten a chance to get physical on the farm this week. I’ve paced up and down the living room bristling with pent up energy long enough. The rain has kept me inside, unable to get on the land for fear of destroying the grass and rutting the pasture up. Although it’s still a little soggy it is able withstand the light load of our UTV filled with chainsaws, fuel and a small chipper courtesy of my In-laws (thank you Roger!)
You know, excited though I am, the energy to get going on the farm is never quite enough to over-ride the fact that I’m out of shape after being indoors all winter, it doesn’t take long and chain sawing is hard work! I’m also behind on cutting down the overcrowded trees in the woodland pig pen to turn it into a Silvopasture (fewer trees with good grass underneath) area. The short days of winter just didn’t allow for it, and I have gone back into the usual small bite approach to this part of the farm as we have to do with most of the others. On top of that I have fencing to do and gates to frame and hang, plus all of that wood will be logged, moved, and stacked for keeping a cheery fire next winter.
It would be nice to get enough dry warm weather together to take a good look at the bees and get them spring cleaned. The pollen patties that I put on seem to have done the trick in giving them a little boost as well as ensuring that they made it through. As you may have noticed on the Facebook video, the boxes are looking a little the worst for wear in regard to mildew and peeling paint. I put a good deal of effort into prepping the wood (sanding and priming) before painting so they really shouldn’t be peeling yet, I guess you just don’t get paint like you used to. This year I have a trick up my sleeve to combat the ever present Wax Moths that doesn’t use chemicals. In case you’ve never heard of these before, they are a moth that sneaks into hives during the night when the guards are not as effective and lays eggs in the more quiet corners. The grubs hatch and eat wax and spoil honey. It seems to be against harmony at first glance but think of it this way, their job is actually to remove the old combs from tree hollows etc. that wild colonies leave. A clean up crew! Anyway, we get a lot here, I ought to video them in droves fluttering around the hives at dusk. They are a particular nuisance if boxes of frames are stored poorly like the honey supers over winter. If you’d like the recipe for the “trap” just get in touch, don’t forget though, it’s new to me too so it might not work as well as we would like.
In other news, and I’m excited about this one, Keith from Arkenburg Farms has asked me to give a demonstration on chicken processing at his farm this year. This is something that I’ve considered doing for a while and it ties in with me putting on courses for various types of animal processing from live animal through to butchering over here on our farm (I have a way that I’ve developed that’s a little different than the usual plus easier!)
It’s going to be an exciting year!