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Swarm Trap Update
2025 Swarm Trap Update The swarm trap was unsuccessful this season. We actually didn’t even see as many honeybees in the gardens this year as in previous years. Each time I checked in on the hive, there weren’t any signs interest from anyone. Not even the wasps moved in this year! The hive has been taken apart and is now in the garage for storage. It will be set up again next year to try to catch a swarm, but I may also look into finding another way to get bees. Working with the bees was something I missed a lot this season and I would like to find a…
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Setting up a Swarm Trap
After my last experience with purchasing packages of honeybees, I decided that I did not want to do it again. The process for creating packages and how they are handled are cruel and I am pretty sure the system is very harmful to the bees. Since I started getting packages of bees, more than ten years ago, there have been so many issues. I have ordered packages from various places in the hopes that some would be better than the others, but they have not been. Every package I have received has had little to no sugar water left and they had been in the boxes for too long. There…
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2025 Seed Starting
Spring is here and seed starting is in full swing! At this point, some of the seedlings have even been planted out into the garden. I wanted to write this post though, to talk about the process and things that I use to do my seed starting. I have been using soil blocks for several years now, but this year I used a new soil recipe to create the blocks with. The results have been good so far. Several months ago I came across a YouTube video from Blossom and Branch Farm with a soil blocking recipe. https://youtu.be/vFokGiK1MhE In the video, Briana broke down each of the ingredients and then…
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Greenhouse Refresh
To start off the new year, we decided to make big changes in the greenhouse. When looking at the wooden beds that we had put in there originally, we noticed that they were rotting already. Since we had already removed all of the plants from the beds, we decided to go ahead and change up everything! We decided to try metal beds to replace them. The new beds arrived quickly and we got to work setting them up and them filling them with soil from the beds that were already in the greenhouse. We had to work in sections because the size and shape of the new beds is very…