Honey Extraction

 

The first time we tried beekeeping we had the hive for about a year and a half and got no honey.  We tried again this year and purchased two nucleus colonies in April.  As luck would have it this is a great year for honey and we have already extracted honey twice (for a total of 47 pounds) and are expecting to be extracting more soon.

Here is a photo of our two hives, the bottom super holds the queen and larvae and the top medium supers hold the honey.  We got the bees out of the honey supers by placing a fume board on the top to drive them out.  My husband then collected the frames of capped honey and brought them into our garage.

Here is a frame that is greater than 90% capped honey.  This is important because it ensures that the honey will be of the right moisture content (around 17-18%) that won't ferment.  The bees know when it is dry enough and cap it off.

 

We then uncapped the honey using an uncapping tool over a bucket.  These can be purchased at Full Moon Apiary at their store in Tupelo's Bakery in Monticello (every time I go there to get new bee supplies I also get a treat from the bakery, yum).

The frames are then placed into the extractor.  We rented this extractor from the Apalachee Beekeeping Association .  Members can rent it for only $10 a day (with a $25 cleaning deposit).  This is perfect for a small operation like ours.

 

When that honey started to drip then pour out of the extractor it was so exciting!  Below it we have a second bucket with filters to filter out dead hive beetles and bees along with any wax (I am trying to figure out what to do with all my wax now!)

 And eventually the bucket had over 20 pounds of honey.

 

This is from our first batch.  Our second batch had even more.  My husband is hoping to make some mead (he is a home brewer) with the large quart jar holding three pounds of honey.

Pickles!

My cucumbers have been doing pretty well and I wanted to try canning pickles instead of just the fridge pickles I have been making.  I like the instructions on the Pick Your Own site.

They suggest to use a canning mix.  The recipes all call for 8-11 pounds of pickles.  That canner used to belong to my late Grandma Anna, it makes me happy to be able to use it and think of her.

I had been collecting pickles for a few days though and only had about three pounds.  So I had to do some math and hope that it works.

My husband wanted some dill pickles so I started with those.

 

I cut off the ends (the blossom ends contain an enzyme that make the pickles mushy) and cut them into spears.  Apparently putting grape leaves in with them make them more crunchy.  Luckily I have four muscadine grape vines in my garden.

 

And here they are waiting to go into the water bath for processing.  Can't wait to try them.

My bees have been very busy (we are planning to do a honey extraction next week) and I am hoping to have some more cucumbers to pickle in the near future.

Pick Your Own Blueberries

Today we took the kids to Green Meadows Farm in Monticello to pick blueberries.

We have done this several years now but the last few years they had been picked out.  Not this year, they have a ton of berries and they told us that the day before they had had 1200 people there. 

We were able to find plenty of berries.  They kids seemed to enjoy it.

You had to keep an eye on the three year old and remind him to pick the purple berries, not the green.

 

 

We picked three pounds.  I don't have enough for jam so I think we will make some blueberry ice cream.  The owner of the farm, Delores Green, has the best recipe and she sells a cook book for $10 at the farm.  They also sell the ice cream, but they were all out.

Today's Harvest

Today's Harvest

 

I hope I have enough cucumbers to make canned dill pickles.  I like some of the recipes on this website and find their directions helpful:  Pick Your Own

Dining from the Garden

Usually I don't get much from my garden.  But this year I am starting to see success.

 

I finally got some carrots to grow in my raised beds.  The trick is to thin mercilessly and to make sure the soil is loose.  They didn't grow very long because they are in raised beds.

 

 

This morning I noticed a huge cucumber on my vines.  I had seen one blossom early on but figured nothing would come of it.  Then I happened to see it this morning while my husband was out checking the beehives.  It weighed in at 14 ounces.  My husband claims that I bought one at Publix to stick in my garden.  I was as surprised to see it there as he was.  There are a lot more blossoms on the vines now, so I am hoping that we will see more in the near future.

I made refrigerator pickles out of it.  They taste pretty good.  They are on the menu for tonight with roasted carrots (in butter) along with BBQ chicken (no, not the ones in our backyard) and some corn I did buy at Publix.  Should be a delicious summer meal.

 

Grow Your Own Mushrooms

Back in October I attended a workshop hosted at Ten Speed Greens that was conducted by Bent Tree Farm.  (Unfortunately Ten Speed Greens will be closing up shop this summer).  We learned briefly about growing your own mushrooms and then made our own shiitake mushroom logs and got to bring one home.

We recently cut down some trees on our property so I decided to make some more.  You start with logs approximately four to six inches in diameter and about 40 inches long.  Oak and sweet gum are the best to use.  I had previously used Fungi Perfect for an oyster mushroom kit but at the workshop we were told that Mushroom People is also a good source.  I ordered their Shitake Mushroom Starter kit.

Here is a portion of the kit, it included 300 plugs of mushroom spawn, paraffin wax for sealing, daubers for placing the was.  The kit also said that it was supposed to have 10 metal tags, but it did not.

 

The logs should be 4-6 inches in diameter and approximately 40 inches long.  They should be stored up off the ground to avoid contamination by "weed" species of mushroom.

Then you drill holes 1 inches deep with a 5/16 inch drill bit.  Place them approximately 6 inches apart on four "sides" of the log, placing each row of holes off center of the next.  Then place the plugs in the holes, tap them flat, and seal with the wax.  Make sure you heat the wax up in advance (I placed it in an old tin can inside a water bath in a crock pot).

 

At the workshop they told us that Florida has enough rainfall that as long as your logs are placed in the open they should be ok, but watering them is better.  Here I am soaking them for 8-12 hours (on each end) and will do this every two weeks.

 

Lets hope this works!  It may take 9 months for the logs to fruit, but then they will continue to fruit during the fruiting season for up to ten years.

The Garden is Buzzing Again

We tried beekeeping back in 2012, I think our hive lasted almost a year, and then we were not able to keep it queen right and it died.  So, this spring we decided to try again.  This time with two hives (which is suggested by beekeepers).  Once again we got our bee supplies such as hive bodies and frames from Full Moon Apiary  that has a shop at Tupelo's Bakery in Monticello.

We ordered to NUCS (nucleus colonies) from Bobbee's Honey and Pollination Services.  The owner is an old friend of my husband.

 

When our bees were ready my husband went and got them and we installed them in our hives.

We had a chance to educate the neighbor about bees while we did so.  Fortunately he is cool with us keeping bees between our two houses.

Find the queen!  This years queens are marked with a green dot (if your order them marked).  They can be hard to spot when they are not marked, but after some practice you should be able to spot an unmarked queen as well.

At the suggestion of some beekeepers with the Apalachee Beekeeping Association (I suggest that you check them out if you want to keep bees in the Tallahassee area) I got free paint from the Swap Shop at the Solid Waste Authority.  Beehives don't have to be boring old white.

 

I make my husband do a lot of the beekeeping stuff, poor guy.

 

I have to admit, the bees are really fun to watch.

 

The bees seem to be doing ok, we just put a super on the purple hive.  I don't know if we will get honey this year.  Beekeeping is not easy.  Fortunately we have a number of farms that sell locally produced honey.  I am listing a few of them below, I suggest you check them out!

Full Moon Apiary

Orchard Pond Organics

Turkey Hill Farm

 

New Chicks on the Block

 

We first got chickens in the fall of 2012.  I had wanted them for a while but it wasn't until I heard a neighbors chickens two doors down that I decided to get some.  Shortly afterward my neighbor came down to tell me that they were moving and wanted to know if we could take her chickens.  I ended up with 7 at one point, but after some predator losses I still have three of the neighbors chickens.  They are no longer spring chickens however, and their egg laying production has started to drop off recently.  It's still enough for our family of four, but they are getting older and I know it won't be enough for ever.

 

They are still useful because they help eat bugs like ticks from our yard. 

But lets face it, these ladies are getting ready for retirement.

 

Back in January I placed and order with My Pet Chicken .  I thought about hatching our own (but what would we do with the roosters) and I thought about buying locally.  However, I really wanted certain breeds, I wanted them to be sexed (female) and I only wanted four.  My Pet Chicken was a good option for this.  So we put in the order and waited.  And waited.  We got supplies ready because you have to be ready with a brooder set up.  The chicks need to stay pretty warm.  For this small operation we borrowed a brooder made by a coworker out of a Rubbermaid tub.  At first I bought the 250w red heat lamp recommended on the web site.  That was too hot for my small operation.  A 75w red heat bulb for reptiles was perfect!  We bought a chick feeder and waterer along with chick feed and some shavings and we were good to go!

 

Monday my chicks shipped.  Tuesday morning I got the call from the post office!  They were here!

This was the most exciting package I have ever received from the post office.

 

I got an Easter egger (lays blue/green eggs), a white leghorn (lays white eggs), a silver cuckoo marans (lays dark brown eggs) and a buff orpington (lays light brown eggs).  My egg basket is going to be really colorful in about six months.

They settled into their little brooder pretty quickly.  I checked each for pasty butt (sounds fun, right?) and gave them each a drink of water and showed them the food.  They are all doing great.

 

 

This age is super cute too, so we are all checking them as we go in and out of the garage and of course getting them used to some handling.  I named this one piccata.  Chicken Piccata.

The Fun of Picking Your Own

When I was a child some of my best memories were going to the apple farm to buy apples.  It was even better when it was a pick your own place.  So when I had my own kids I decided to take advantage of the wide range of pick your own places here in the Tallahassee area.  Last month I was really excited to see that Orchard Pond Organics was hosting a pick your own strawberry event at their farm.  We finally made it out there this first weekend in may.

 

Our eight year old had a great time and asked me why these strawberries had white flowers (we had visited a local school garden for Spiral Scouts where they had pink flowers last week).  That gave me a chance to talk about the different varieties of strawberries and how you want different ones for cross pollination and a better crop.  We have plans to plant strawberries in our own garden when the next season comes around.

 

Our three year old was able to follow directions with proper guidance and just pick the ripe berries.

 

Now what are we going to do with four pounds of strawberries? 

Time to pull out the jam recipe!

 

Orchard pond organics also had their farm stand open so we bought some kale, potatoes, carrots and beef as well.  We are planning a tasty local meal for tonight!

 

Grow Your Own

My greatest goal is to be able to grow more of my own food.  Unfortunately I did not inherit my grandma Anna's green thumb.  But I keep on trying.  We recently had removed some trees (either dead, ill, or endangering structures) which opened up some sun in our backyard.  So I thought I would give a raised garden bed another try.

My eight year old was explaining worms to my not yet three year old.

 

Worms!  Everyone loves worms!

 

And everyone loves the chance to play in the dirt.

 

Planting peas.  We also planted some carrots.

I bought some blueberries from Tallahassee Native Nurseries.  I also really like to get down to Just Fruits and Exotics when I can, and they have great information on their site.  But I didn't have time to drive to Medart this weekend.

Once again putting the kids to work.  My husband helped too.  We had removed some azaleas in this location (they like acidic soil just like blueberries) because we wanted to have pretty flowers and food here.

Blueberries installed.  I am going to work hard to keep them watered (although one watering emptied our rain barrel) and fertilized with holly-tone on schedule.