Seeing a honey bee swarm

A swarm in May — is worth a load of hay.

A swarm in June — is worth a silver spoon.

A swarm in July — isn’t worth a fly.

If the old English poem is correct, then the swarm of honeybees I recently saw isn’t worth much. But I thought it priceless.

Having grown up on a farm and now living there, I spend a lot of time outdoors. When I’m not in the office, you usually can find me either gardening or farming.

But in those nearly 50 years, I have never witnessed a honey bee swarm until recently.

I was working in the garden, putting up hog panel fences to support our tomatoes. It was a hot day with  little breeze. The valley was quiet.

Suddenly I heard a droning sound that grew louder. I looked at the sky as a cloud of bees approached from the south. It was a living twister at least 30 yards wide and 20 yards deep flying above my head.

A few bees landed beside me as if to say hello, but quickly flew back up to join their colleagues. Clearly this bipedal creature was not a place for safe harbor.

The twisting maelstrom of bees churned violently as it passed by in a buzzing crescendo. The murmuring music started to fade as they flew past.

I watched with astonishment as the swarm flew over the creek and headed west into the woods.

We do not raise honey bees and do not have any domestic hives nearby. So the swarm likely was wild bees simply looking for a new location.

Swarms occur when the queen bee leaves the nest — usually due to overcrowding or congestion — and the worker bees follow. It’s nature’s way of relocation that is part of the life cycle of bees.

It’s a dangerous journey. Bees can survive only a few days without food. They gorge themselves on honey and nectar before leaving. A new food source is a critical part of their new home.

Some bees stay behind and a virgin queen is coronated. Both colonies can prosper. Or both can fail. It’s one of life’s risks.

Beekeepers try to prevent swarms because it would be akin to raising livestock and leaving the gate open. Capturing a swarm was considered a treasure for pioneers, who would put the valuable honey to good use. But not — according to the old poem — in July.

The swarm came and went in less than 30 seconds. It’s an experience I will never forget.

(Posted by Chris)

First cutting of hay is done

The late and wet spring has created a challenge for all farmers in Wisconsin as continued rains made many fields inaccessible to tractors.
We finally harvested our first cutting of hay in mid-June, nearly three weeks after our first cutting last year. Chris took vacation from work so he could focus on baling hay. It was a heavy first crop, which is fortunate, because our hay supply from last year was running out.
Despite some equipment challenges, we were able to put into the barn nearly 2,000 bales. We could have had 400 more, but our hay baler broke down before we could get it all in. Then it rained for eight consecutive days, essentially ruining the hay that was left in the fields.
We have put that hay into large round bales and will use it for animal bedding in the winter.
Meanwhile, our focus will be getting the baler fixed and to get ready for our second cutting of hay, which so far is looking very good.
You can't have too much hay because it can store for many years in the barn.

Robins, not bats, in the belfry

Brambleberry was the home of Sara Clair, Chris's great aunt, before we moved in and opened it up as a bed and breakfast.
One of Aunt Sara's trademarks when she and Uncle Leland ran the farm was to ring the dinner bell for lunch. Of course they called it dinner back then and it was quite a mid-day spread. The bell is solid iron and you could hear it echoing throughout our valley when it rang.
We've kept the bell as a tribute to Aunt Sara and have it mounted on a tall post near our back kitchen door. This year a robin decided that the top of the post -- right under the bell -- was a good place to build a nest.
We love robins, but we fight with them every spring to prevent them from building nests in hanging plants. We also have to take down our signature brambleberry wreath that welcomes guests by the front door because the birds insist that it would be a perfect place to build a nest.
So we watched as the robins built the nest under the bell. This past week we noticed that the eggs had hatched and it's a crowded nest -- four chicks! They are surely ugly chicks for the first few weeks and they keep mother robin quite busy bringing worms and other food for the hungry mouths.
We will honor the sanctuary of the robin and watch as the birds get old enough to fly away.
Perhaps when the last one leaves the nest we will ring the bell in its honor!

The sweet season of syrup-making

Pure maple syrup

There's gold in those trees -- the maple trees, that is. This is the time of year in Wisconsin and Minnesota where maple sap is collected from the trees and turned into delicious, liquid-gold syrup.

We make syrup in an old-fashioned way. We have about 30 trees with specially designed bags hung on each tap. We collect the sap once or twice a day, depending on how heavy the run is. 

After a terrible season last year when the weather warmed too quickly, so far this spring the weather has been great for sap flow. The best conditions are for temperatures above 40 degrees during the day and dipping below freezing at night. This moves the sap from the roots into the trunk and provides the constant drip.

Most of our trees are not sugar maples, but you can make syrup from any maple tree. The ratio of sap to syrup in a sugar maple is 40 to 1, but it's closer to 50 to 1 with our maples.

Over one recent weekend we collected more than 50 gallons of sap. After it was cooked down, we ended up with about 156 ounces of syrup -- a gallon and three cups -- that was filtered and stored in canning jars.

The primary cooking down -- a process that evaporates the water -- takes place in our garage over a wood-fired stove. The stove's flat surface holds two roasting pans, which we fill with sap and continue to refill as it evaporates. When the sap has thickened enough,  it is brought inside the house for the finishing process.

The sap being boiled down

It's a long and tedious process, but we enjoy making such a delicious product from our land. Guests who stay at our inn -- Brambleberry Bed and Breakfast -- get to enjoy the fruits of our labors with breakfast.

We also have additional syrup available for purchase when we have a surplus. That looks like it will happen this year. 

A trio to start the lambing season

Mary and her three triplet lambs. 

Lambing season 2013 has started at Brambleberry.
 Mary, one of our original ewes, had a set of triplets on Feb. 13.
We had intended to wait longer this year before having lambs due, but like other years an amorous and determined ram decided last fall that fences were no obstacle for him getting his job done.
He apparently did it well in the one day that he escaped because we've also had twins and a single birth in the past four days, with several more looking ready to birth as well.
Saturday morning our Valentine weekend guests were lucky enough to witness a live birth.
So far all of the lambs have been boys, which is OK, since these are all crossbred lambs and not animals that we would keep for breeding stock. We would prefer  that our purebred sheep will have ewes.
The weather has been cold, with overnight lows close to zero, but the lambs so far are doing fine. We hand-strip some mother's milk and tube-feed our lambs just to make sure they get some colostrum which is essential to their survival.
Of course it also means that we're not getting much sleep, but that's part and parcel with lambing season.