Happy Harvest Blog
Snow In May!!?
Quite a surprise to wake up to several inches of snow in the morning.
Gorgeous, just unexpected for Mother’s Day.
The pigs were non-plussed. Maybe they’ve seen snow before, but it doesn’t seem like it.
The squirrels were very funny, bounding around in the snow, tunneling and popping up through it like gophers. Competition is heightened since I blocked squirrel access to the bird feeders, and…
All over
Dorian has passed. The chickens are all fine, the pig house did not flip over, one beehive had an outer lid blown off, no cars or structures were damaged. Casualties: clothesline, woodshed roof has another rip, the big hazelnut tree outside my window is tipped over:( It may live, but it’s at 45° with the roots torn and heaved up. I don’t know how well nut trees adapt.
A thorough bee day
I had a big bee day, doing all things bee. Building frames and parts, hive inspection, expansion, and more. They needed all kinds of things, including a yard cleanup. I doubt I would have lost that swarm if I was on this a few days earlier, but what's flown is flown. Now all the hives are set on concrete pads, all the wood scraps are cleaned up, and the bee yard looks more classy bee apartment structures, less bee shantytown.
Waiting for rain
The guinea got into the greenhouse adjunct garden and while I was helping him find his way out, I came across this little fellow burrowed in. Almost, but not quite, completely hidden. I hope he's not responsible for eating my lettuce heads. There's 20 missing. We have rain on the way, followed by a heatwave. I've finished the course of antibiotics for Lyme disease. On the whole, I feel better than I did before I got bit, except for the sudden powerful episodes of fatigue that put me to sleep in the middle of otherwise productive days,
June frost
The frost looks like lavender. According to my "research" (and I forget my source), in the last eight years, it's only frosted once in June, and that was the 1st. Here we are in the first week, and we got a doozy. It's going to throw off all my planning numbers (this year I planned for a May 20 last frost). I got to try out the Almanzo Wilder splash the plant with water before the sun hits it thing. The potatoes were just poking up, and a few of the squashes were frozen in spite of covering
Lovely. I have Lyme disease.
I've missed a couple of posts, but I've got excuses. And Lyme disease. It's been an epic week, getting pigs, and bees, cut off from posting images and exposed to poison ivy, plus some community group stuff I'm involved in. Saturday a bite by my knee that had been unusually itchy and inflamed since I was bitten a week earlier hinted at forming a "sun dog" in the morning, and by afternoon was the unmistakable bull's eye rash.I'm lucky; it's a 50-50 chance that Lyme manifests in the unambiguous target rash.
First Real Garden Day
I felt like I should start gardening like I mean it, so I put some brain work in in the winter planning the planting schedule for starts and direct sowing, and it sure feels good now to have a schedule to follow.I mapped the garden in seven areas, for crop rotation, estimated how much of X thing I want to grow, and then calc'ed back/forward from frost date and made a calendar.
Blizzard squirrel!
This is a real storm. We had a foot of snow overnight and supposed to get another foot during the day today, with blistering winds. 2300 Nova Scotians are already out of power, and only emergency workers are allowed to drive.
Instagram.
I may not make a blog post every day, but at least I Insta.
Bite size.
