Kinder Cashmere?

One of my bucks grew a prodigious undercoat this winter. He's been shedding all month.

This is California aka Clark Kent aka Supergoat
(Because he's mild mannered & flew cross-country to get here).

This downy undercoat is indeed called cashmere, although it would be nowhere near the quality of fiber that would come off a true cashmere goat.

I've had goats grow undercoats before, but never like this. The fiber artist in me is fascinated and wants to harvest it! He absolutely does not like a brush but will let me pluck it out until he gets bored and wants to move on.

Unfortunately it's not exactly spinnable quality. It's short, scurffy looking, and has a lot of his black hair mixed in.

It's driving me nuts because I need an updated photo of him but he looks pretty scruffy right now. Not that he cares, but I'm sure it will be cooler once his shedding is all done.

Kinder Cashmere? © April 2015 by Leigh
at http://www.5acresandadream.com/

Garden Growing

It's been about a month since I last reported on the garden. We've had lots and lots of rain since then, so we're not getting as much done in the garden as I would like. But things are growing and here they are.

Fall planted garlic bed

Strawberry bed

Strawberries will be ready soon!

Beets  (which the deer haven't eaten!!!) and broccoli

Red raspberries. I'm hopeful for a harvest this year!

Lettuce, radishes, multiplier onions

Comfrey. I've been replanting comfrey, mostly under the fruit
trees but I also planted a number of plants in their own bed.

Peas, turnips, and heartsease. The heartsease (johnny-jump
-up) are all volunteers and make a very good living mulch.

Just planted - sweet potato slips

It's just now time to start planting the rest of my summer garden, and our field corn as well. Hopefully we'll get good weather so the ground can dry out a bit. Then it's full steam ahead.

Garden Growing © April 2015 by Leigh
at http://www.5acresandadream.com/

First Hive Check

My honeybees were installed last Saturday. After several days it is recommended to check on the queen, to see if she has been released from her cage. Since we had a forecast for deluge all week I took advantage of the first break in the weather to take a look. No photos of this and I'm sorry for that, because the whole thing is so interesting. Right now I'm doing this solo because Dan's at work, and a camera at this stage of my beekeeping experience would be in the way. In the caption to the photo below, I give a brief description of what's what, so hopefully my description makes sense.

Green box is the roof, the unpainted part is the feeder. On top of the feeder is the 
quilt box, hidden from view by the roof section. 2 hive boxes are used at first. The
queen  cage was put  on the topbars of the bottom box; bees were dumped on top

I removed the roof, quilt, and feeder. I was amazed at how much comb had already been built. It all appeared to be following the topbars, which is indeed a good thing, because Warré hived bees are notorious for building comb every whichaway. Next I removed the top hive box and gently set it aside.

I found the queen cage where I'd placed it, but under a pile of bees. I poofed the bees away with my bee smoker and discovered that the queen was still in her cage. It had only been a couple of days so I could have left her in longer, but considering the weather I decided to release her. Opinions vary on how long to give the bees to get her out, but most agree that if she's been with them for at least two days she will usually be accepted.

Now empty queen cage. The white in the top compartment is
candy. If you look closely, you can see where I'd poked a hole
through it. The hole at the cage bottom was where I let her out.

The queen cage has two openings, one filled with candy, through which the bees work to release her. There is also a corked opening on the other end in case a direct release is needed. I removed the cork, set the cage back down, and she walked right out.

After removing the now empty queen cage I reassembled the hive, topped off the feeder, and left the bees to get on with their bee business. As soon as I got back into the house it began to pour!

A small block of wood was used to narrow the hive
opening by about two-thirds. This helps the new
colony better defend the hive from robbers & the like.

The thing to watch for was pollen being brought in. Pollen is the bees' source of protein and is fed to baby bees (larvae). It is mixed with nectar and bee secretions in what is known as "bee bread." If the bees are bringing in a good amount, it means the queen is present and laying.

I'm not yet sure what a "good amount" is, so I still experience a lot of concern as to whether everything is going well. There was only a trickle at first, but I've noticed that pollen deliveries have increased quite a bit as the days pass, so I'm taking that as a good sign!

Next - Bee Plants - Expanding My Definition of Edible

First Hive Check © April 2015 by Leigh
at http://www.5acresandadream.com/