No Farm is Complete Without a Plow

Nothing is so quintessentially farm as is a plow. And since we had such a large area we wanted to turn over into gardens, and since I'd succeeded in almost causing a hot oil fire by overworking the tiller attachment on the tractor while trying to do so, we concluded we really needed to get a plow for the tractor. Don, the aficionado of Craigs List" Farm Equipment For Sale", tracked down a used plow right down the street. Despite it's very used appearance, it was in great shape. As Don dragged it behind the tractor and down the path, it reminded me of a water-skier putting out a dirt wake, and stirring up the earth into a stoney froth. Now we can plow through all that heavy, stoney dirt and turn it over and ready it for the tiller. None too soon. The rain has kept the earth a heavy, clumpy mess. With the help of some much needed sun, the plow and the tiller, over these next few days, we will get in the seeds and plants hopefully in time to mature before falls first frost.

Feathering Her Nest

It took seeing it in person for me to understand how birds actually do feather their nests. This lady turkey has feathered hers by pulling out all her breast feathers to use. Motherly love!! I only wish one of her eggs would actually hatch so that she might not have made all these sacrifices in vain.

Bad News and Good News

As you may already know, we lost 75% of our bee hives over the winter. Seems like most bee keepers had significant losses. We aren't even sure why. It may have been mites, but it may have been the bees warmed up during a warming period and then subsequently froze to death when the temps dropped again. Regardless of the reason,we'll be harvesting less honey this summer. The good news is, we've got 6 new 'nucs' (starter hives) from a local honey bee supplier and we're starting again. The other silver lining, is the bees that died left behind the honey they didn't eat so we were able to harvest that honey and resupply our inventory, which had dropped to zero. It's a little darker than the honey we harvested in August, most likely because the honey from August was wildflower/clover honey, and the honey we took from the winter stash was from goldenrodOur dead bees.The new hives You can see the difference in color in the picture. The honey on the right is clover, and the one on the left is goldenrod....or so I guess. Both are delicious and it's hard to tell much, if any, difference in the flavor.