Hi All,
Yup, it was confirmed, the South Hive is going through a Queen transition. Now I need to leave them alone for another 2 weeks and once that is up we go in to see if she started laying eggs. Yesterday we checked in on the Middle Hive to see how prepared they are for Winter. They have about 80% of their honey box full so now I need to find out if that will be enough to get them through Winter. When we first got out to the hives I thought they may have been under attack from robber bees! They are not, everyone is safe and sound. Robber bees are bees from the area that smell the honey in other hives and come in to take that honey back to their hives. Robber bees like to hang out on the side & back of the hives looking for other spots to get in since the entrance always has guard bees attending to who is coming and going in each hive. The big tell tale sign is when you see bees wrestling in front of the hive entrance! Yes, it gets lethal! All is well in Fertile GroundWorks Bee Land!
King’s Academy was out this week for the first time this school year! They are on the roster to come help in the garden once a month for the rest of the school year. Great crew of 17 students, their 5 chaperones and teacher. This week they dove right in to chores; they divided and conquered in the garden! Part of the crew helped Enrique prep bed I01 since it was still in the shade and we were all trying to beat the heat that day! Another part of the crew joined Brenda in the Orchard to help her figure out an ongoing irrigation issue that will be put to rest as well as helped SB weed in the Orchard. The rest of the crew joined Amy and me, helping to glean out bed AB27 of it’s butternut squash (172# of squash!), glean the greens from those plants, feed & water the worms, cleaned labels and paired gloves. After break we switched crews up a bit and part of Amy and my crew split; some to help Amy and the regular volunteers pack produce for deliveries and the other part of the crew helped me to prep bed I02. The rest of the crew joined Brenda back in the Orchard and Enrique in weeding out the squash bed. I think they left with more energy than when they came with! It was really nice getting to share our passion with the students and are looking forward to having them back out! Thank you King’s Academy!
Leif’s class helped out with continued planting in bed K05 and got the new transplants watered in. Laura’s crew shelled Fava beans and planted them in bed M04. ELM continued planting bed K05 with more Caraflex cabbage. Kelly and the crews have been doing a great job at getting bed K05 prepped and planted!
The Berry Patch had the dead canes pruned out this week and the irrigation was worked on. Garden Wide gopher trapping is still ongoing. Lance continues his weed work with spraying the bindweed-it looks like it is helping out, I am not noticing as much bindweed in the garden as we usually have!
Bed AB27 was finished getting prepped and bed A13 was also prepped. Beds AB34, M03 & N09 got a good watering and afterwards was covered in straw since it was left without for a few days and ended up drying out. Straw is always an important component of bed prep. If there is no plan to plant it the next day we need to cover it in straw that way it does not dry out. Yes, even with the hose lines being placed back onto the beds it is simply not enough to keep the bed wet, that straw is still needed.
Plantings for the week;
Bed I01 & I02 got 32 Marathon broccoli & 103 Red Burger onion and bed AB27 got 55 Song cauliflower and……….these were the beds that the King’s Academy students got ready for us a couple of days beforehand! AB27 was finished up with over 300 Chesnook Red garlic, AB32 now has ~140 Caraflex cabbage and AB34 got 180 Primo cabbage. Bed N09 received 118 Burgundy broccoli and 346 Shandong garlic, with another line still needing to be planted with garlic!
Over 450# of produce was harvested and sent in to our local food pantries this week! Great job everyone!
Thank you to everyone who helped out in the garden this past week.
Take care
Lori