Draggin' the Line: August Homestead Update

I feel I need to warn you or apologize ahead of time in some way. August is my least favorite time of year (October is my favorite). All of the pests, diseases, weeds, etc. all seem to crescendo, leaving me with a feeling of being overwhelmed and having somehow failed my little homestead. This entire year has been a struggle, and it would be dishonest of me to just portray the successes as if I lived in Eden and never had any hard times. So I am not trying to complain- but here is a list of things that you might face if you are a man of the land.

Water, water everywhere

As my son and I walk through the yard to take pictures, the ground goes "slosh slosh slosh" under our feet. That is the sound the ground has made most days this summer. According to AgWeb.com, our region has recieved more than 40 inches since Mother's Day. Our gardens have been like rice paddies most of the time. Many of our friends and family did not even get an opportunity to plant a garden this year because it never dried out enough to WALK in it, never mind till or plow! My wife did most of the planting this year because I dedicated myself to learning all I can about bees and trying to catch swarms. Remember my post about bait hives? Exactly 0% of those boxes caught swarms. In fact, I and all the beekeepers I know have seen very little swarming at all this year, which is very, very strange. The swarms that did happen came 3 weeks later than usual. remember that phrase, "3 weeks later than usual". I'll come back to it.

Shortly after planting the gardens, my wife started experiencing "morning" sickness all day every day, which has not abated since. My wife is one of the most industrious, hard-working people I know, and she is much tougher than I am. If she is laid out on the couch, she's sick. I am learning how many things she does for me and for the homestead now that I have to take up her chores or let them fall by the wayside. I consider cultivating life within the womb to be the highest calling and the most important work a human can do.

I have not had time to pull the weeds very much this summer, and now it is starting to show. Fortunately the weeds are not growing like they usually do. Everything is miniature, like a bonsai. I have never seen amaranth go to seed after only achieving 6" of height. The amaranth patch at the top of this post was planted on purpose, and then became a swamp, and was abandoned to the weeds after the first month of growth. Neither the cultivated amaranth nor the wild amaranth has grown any since late May.

Next we have The Critters

I have a very lassiez-faire approach to critters most of the time because I recognize their right to shelter and feed their families, and I am a pretty sensitive dude. Sometimes things just get ridiculous though! We lost 4 chickens and many cornstalks to raccoons in a short time. This led to me live-trapping them for 2 weeks, which resulted in 7 raccoons and 2 skunks. Live-trapping skunks just ruins my mornings. I don't know who is chowing down on our squash, but I am not really going to be bothered about it. you win some, you lose some.

There have been a ridiculous amount of mice and ants coming indoors all summer. I think they just got tired of being in the rain. The rabbits are taking over as well, but I like having them around.

One thing that I do not like having around is wax moths. If you are not a beekeeper you should not be bothered, but I am officially sick of them! I have spent days and days going through infested equipment at work, burning the cocoons and worms and webs and ruined comb and trying to salvage what I can. My employer used to have a freezer unit to keep the pests at bay but it broke last year and he has neglected to get it fixed. I finally suggested that we use acetic acid to kill the rest of the bugs, and he says "well sure, i've got a vaporizer for just that purpose". I had to count to ten to keep from biting him. All the wasted equipment! All the wasted time and money! So last week I spent 2 hours in a gas mask and rubber gloves commiting genocide against wax moths and hive beetles, and I don't feel sorry one bit! Pests in the bee equipment puts a serious damper on my positivity.

In fact, to be honest, I have been depressed most of this year. I put a lot of effort and intention and prayer into beekeeping this year in preparation for a honey flow that could come anytime between late May to mid-July. in mid-July I sadly took away the empty honey supers and put them back in storage, and then moped around for 2 weeks with my tail between my legs. My boss has been keeping bees for 40 years, and he said "Don't feel bad, I have seen many bad years, but this is quite possibly the worst I've ever seen". I asked whether it is possibly the worst year for bees in history, and he said with a grim face, "Quite possibly".

So then August is here, and I decide to drag myself out to the bee yards again to see what's happening, though I'm sure it will be nothing.... HOLY MOSES! in the 2 weeks I spent licking my wounds and wondering how I got such bad luck, THE BEES WERE MAKING HONEY! We don't even know where they found the flowers blooming at this time, or how they flew in between storms that came every day one after another. But they did, and the famine is lifted! We are still not gonna make any money, but at least that knot in my stomach and the tears behind my eyes when I think about the bees have subsided.

I think I learned that you can't give up just before the miracle happens. After all, everything has been two or three weeks later this year than normal, including this honey flow!

Plus there's nothing wrong with these tomatoes, even if they are late

Or this corn:

The chickens say the okra looks healthy

And the flowers are happy even if they are wet

and yesterday I harvested about 15 lbs of bonsai onions, a gallon of bonsai beets, and 3 lbs of bonsai carrots. Here are some of my bonsai peppers:

I declare.... have you ever seen such like?

Now that we are sufficiently cheered by happy plants and honey and acetic acid genocide, there are a few more things I'd like to mention.

Blight

We have two apple trees on the property as well as a peach and several pears. The apples always get spots on the leaves and then turn brown early and I never knew why til this year. Less than 50 ft away there is a giant, beautiful Cedar tree which makes me happy every time I walk under it. Unfortunately it has these weird orange jelly balls on its branches that spread to the apple trees and make them sick. I don't know what to do about it....

and the cucumbers don't seem to thrive in the monsoon. they get yellow blight, like this:

Well Contamination

After the payout for my post about Chaga last week, I felt like celebrating with a pot of Chaga. So I brewed some up and took a sip. It did not taste right at all.... There was a bitter/sweet flavor that was absolutely un-stomach-able. I sadly had to compost my Chaga tea. I am in the habit of drinking 3-5 quarts of water per day during the summer. The next morning at work I had barely got half-way into my first quart when I just felt off. I decided we better not mess around with this (especially with a pregnant mama and a toddler!) so we brought samples of our water to a lab for testing. It came back high in E.Coli! So now we are bringing in water from other friends' and family's wells to drink, boiling dishwashing water, etc....

When it rains, It pours. I am not complaining. I just want to let you know what you might encounter if you decide to start "makin a livin the old hard way / takin and givin day by day....." It is a constant struggle against entropy.

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