I suppose everyone is wondering how our new bee hives are doing…? They’re doing great! Most of our hives are happy and healthy in their new homes on Beaver Creek. However, we did have a part of one hive decide to leave their… hive, ha! This is called swarming, or “bearding,” and happens as a result of the bees’ natural need to reproduce and/or if they find the conditions of their new home unfavorable. Sometimes the queen leaves first, but either way they find a suitable place to coagulate and settle down.
We’ve also been hard at work in the field this week planting collard and kale and cabbage, lettuces such as arugula and butter, and brussel sprouts; ready to harvest for you in anywhere from one to three months!
We’ve started on our onion crop as well! Beginning with red and yellow bulb onions, we broadforked the soil to a soft, workable consistency and used a wire grid to space the onions evenly and finished with a sprinkling of organic, rich compost that we prepared ourselves.
We also started planting our red torpedo onion sets and 400 pounds of shallots!
Note: a bulb is an onion taken from the ground in its season of dormancy for the purpose of storing to be planted and regrown as a new plant at a later time. A set is simply a bunching of young plants to be transplanted.
We will be continuing to plant onions and greens for the next couple of weeks, and we’ll be starting tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, eggplants, okra, and so much more! You can expect to see some transplants for sale at our roadside stand as soon as possible!
Also be on the lookout for new cosmetic items made from our very own beeswax, made by our very own Lorriane! Feel free to reach out to her for more information!
We’re super excited to announce that our carpenter Steve has finished our pheasant tractors! Well.. alright.. they’re chicken tractors. But we’ve got pheasants in ‘em! We’ll be using these to produce eggs to include in our CSA and to sell at our popup market.
(A chicken tractor, in case you’re wondering, is basically a mobile chicken Coop with wheels on one end.)
This system allows our pheasants to range on fresh, new forage daily, simulating open pasturing while protecting our hens from predatory owls, hawks, and raccoons.
We will also be utilizing some chicken tractors for our very first round of… would you believe it?... chickens! We got our adorable Rhode Island Red chicks in this morning! Keep your eyes peeled for pictures!
Have you begun your spring cleaning? We have! We’ve laid fresh mulch around the property, cleaned and reorganized our processing facilities, and taken up the row covers from this past winter. Turns out we clean up nicely!
We are still working on when we will be hosting our Earth Day event. The recent decision made by our governor has caused us to have to further postpone the event until after the ban is lifted.
We are doing well in this time of crisis and hope you and yours are too.
Don’t forget to order your CSA boxes!
