Living and farming with Wildlife

One of my biggest and greatest beliefs is we can farm and live with wildlife. I positively hate to hear how people kill wildlife when you can farm and co-exist all at the same time! As a wildlife advocate and a farmer I do both with ease. I was up very early this morning to beat Tim to feeding. I am home for the duration and he is considered an essential employee so he has been working non stop. 

We secure our animals, use electric fencing and mandatory lockdowns at night. 

We currently have a pair of breeding fox in the area. They have put a lot of pressure on us as well as the neighbors and their fowl. This morning I watched as this girl made her way up to the road heading right into the path of a speeding car. I yelled to her and she stopped in her tracks just in time and did not get hit! She did not see me there and was a bit startled. This is the female, while the male is much bigger and red in color. 

We can do this folks! We do not own the earth and I hope every day during this pandemic it is an eye opener for all! Nature is bigger than all of us.

It must "Bee" that time of year!

Spring is so officially here! This morning our honeybee packages came in. This year we only got two packages because we have bees that came through the winter. In a few weeks we will be making splits from them and expanding the apiary. I would like to get all hives up and going this year. 

This is what 3 pounds of honeybees look like. They had a long journey and needed to get out of there. They are clustered around the queen and a can of sugar water to keep her and them warm.

With the smoker going we were ready to go!

The small piece of wood on top is removed and under that is the queen and the can of sugar water. You have to be quick because they come out very fass.

This is a Queen cage and I have circled the Queen for you. If you see her, you can see her elongated abdomen. She must remain in here for a few days. When a queen is introduced to honeybees, she is not their queen so it takes a few days for them to adopt her pheromones'. If she is released too soon they will kill her.

I spotted this sweet drone hanging out on my hive tool. He looked like he was just waiting for everyone to settle down.

They are poured into the hive, their can of sugar water and a pollen patty is added. The Queen is surrounded by the workers and they are all set.

A feeder is added to the top with sugar water and some Honey B Healthy which has some Spearmint and Lemongrass oil for extra health.

So our honeybee season is underway! I will check in a day or two and take the cork plug out of the Queen cages so they can begin the process of releasing her.

Getting through these tough times with "The Blues"...

All I can do is relax and have a cup of tea. There is not much you can do in these very tough times of uncertainty. It has raised a lot of anxiety in a time I have never seen the likes of in my lifetime. So I am staying home, lots of projects to do and I must say I am a bit happy to do so. My tea concoction is a Chai tea bag combined with a Puka Tea Cinnamon tea bag. Wow what a taste! I'm hoping all of you are finding things to do and are staying safe as well. 

I took some time to dye some fleeces last week. It's hard to see but I used 4 shades of blue and it came out nicely. I have another fleece to spin in the works that looks like all the shades of sherbet!

I'm going to call this yarn "The Blues". I am not quite sure of the yardage yet but hope to get at least two yarns out of it. The fall shows will have a lot to offer. Sadly all our Spring shows had to be cancelled due to this crisis we are in. All I keep saying is , "This too shall pass" as we all move along, please stay safe, shelter in place, get to that project or that one thing you've been meaning to get to. I am looking at this as a gift, a time to recharge and a time to reflect.

It's come to this!

Sadly it's come to this! People coming to pick up eggs and other things are now using the front seat of my Jeep as a pick up zone. As I am self distancing and customers are in need of items, it is the new norm around here. 

Sadly all of our Spring shows have been cancelled and our source of income is diminished, we appreciate people wanting to buy from our small business. I am including hope with each purchase, the flyer for the New England Fiber Festival in November! We need something to look forward to. Everyone stay safe and if you need eggs or any of our other products you can call the farm phone @ 203-881-1986. We can set up your purchases by way of the front seat of my Jeep! 

The Generosity of others...

One of our biggest dreams was to get a Cargo Trailer  when we do shows to support the farm, we wouldn't have to load and unload the truck which can be daunting. As some of you know, I have been involved in Wildlife rescue for many years and am on the Board with my main purpose to help other wildlife rescuers. Last week we went to a company that donates scrap fleece for our meetings for the baby wildlife. This helps so many people and they save us all the reject fleece which is very beneficial to the baby animals that are often orphaned. Tim noted this trailer that they had there and asked about it. The owner who is always so generous and I am indebted to him for the years of donations he has made to wildlife, gifted us this trailer! We are so grateful to him. 

We now have this amazing rig to haul our displays and product to the fiber shows so we can support this way of life we have chosen to live by. So as soon as the opportunity arises, I will pay it forward!

The Colors of the Chicken Egg

Different breeds of chickens can lay different colored eggs. Last year we added a couple new breeds to our flock in hopes of getting those different colors in our eggs. Seen here are the dark brown eggs laid by our Cuckoo Marans. The blue eggs are from Ameraucanas and the olive colored ones were laid by our Olive Egger chickens. I'm still trying to figure out who laid the pink one!

After a day of collection, the chickens are really ramping up their laying!

Our rainbow of the chicken eggs! The Olive Eggers eggs are a bit used to getting used to. You almost think it's a rotten egg! They are delicious and fresh, I tried them myself.  We will have eggs available for $3.00 a dozen. They are fresh and usually laid within a day, you can't get much fresher than that!

Tools of the Trade

Although all my tools for processing fibers is just as important as the next, this little flicker tool is one of my favorite. It may be small but don't let it's size fool you, it is a major tool in fiber processing. The metal teeth don't give when getting through matts and other parts that can be an issue.

It lifts the fibers off the drum carder making hours of intense picking out fibers done in just minutes!

Hardly a fiber left with just one pass of the flicker brush.

The next tool that is a must, is this batt picker. It helps to lift your blended fiber right off the drum carder with ease.

There is this wonderful groove that the picker slides into helping to life the batt right off.

This helps it to slide right off the carder, blended to perfection and ready to spin.

With those amazing tools, I worked through vegetable matter, felted areas that happened when I dyed the mohair and left it smooth and easy to spin. Without these valuable tools, I would still be wrestling with all these things and probably would have given up on spinning this beautiful but challenging mohair. 

Feeding the bees on a beautiful day in New England!

As I have mentioned before, the weather in Connecticut has been very strange for winter this year. We woke up this morning to beautiful temps and before noon it had already hit 60 degrees! So I took the opportunity to look in on the bees and give them some nutritional  support.

We picked up some pollen patties at our local feed store last week but it has been just too cold to open the hives.

I popped open the hive and was greeted by some of the girls. They look great and I noticed they still had some honey reserves on a visual look.

The pollen patty was quickly added to this hive and they went right over and proboscises out they started in on it almost immediately! 

I caught this girl enjoying a bit of the patty that I had smeared from the hive tool.

The top went back on, and watched to see if they were bringing in any pollen but I didn't catch any. The next few weeks are vital for honeybees. The weather can change on a dime. Just a few weeks for Spring to get here, hang in there girls!