On Cars, Bees and Other Stuff

Image by Dave Massey

Our weather here is fantastic right now. Gorgeous cloudless sunny days with a light warm breeze and temps high enough to make working outside without a jacket a real pleasure.

The bees are out and they’re busy as…well, as bees! They’re flying furiously off into all directions and returning so loaded down with willow pollen that I’m amazed they can return at all. All four hives are alive and bursting with activity although one is noticeably much smaller and weaker than the others. We will probably only take honey from the strongest hive this year. We don’t need very much for ourselves anyway and we still have some left over from last year.

I’ve recently begun working in the garden but have also injured my back so I’m pacing myself. We’ve decided to only use one planting bed this year (which means we’ll probably end up using two :O) ) planting just the stuff we use the most. Instead we will concentrate this year on getting a green house built and a good sized herb garden, amongst other things that need doing around the property.

So far I’ve got garlic coming up. I found a few heads of garlic which apparently I forgot to dig up last year and since they were sprouting, I decided to plant them.  So I pulled them up and separated them into individual cloves and replanted them. I’ve got about 25 plants growing. After I did this, I read that you shouldn’t try to propagate your own cloves due to the increased likelihood of disease. Well, too late now, so this will be a test to see how well they do. It doesn’t make alot of sense to me though, if you can’t replant your own garlic, how did people use to grow it? I guess we’ll see. If anyone has any thoughts on this, please feel free to share.

I’ve also planted four rows of parsley, four rows of spinach and two rows of red radishes. In a few weeks I’ll plant more spinach and radishes. I divided my chives and planted them in the garden instead of in pots where I’ve had them for the past few years. I ended up with 25 plants. We use tons of parsley, more like a veggie than an herb really, and lots of chives. We eat alot of greens too so I might add some kale and chard along with the spinach. There are a few other herbs I’d like to plant but that’s about it for the garden this year.

And finally, I wanted to share a very interesting and thought-provoking article with you on cars (and transportation in general) and how it has changed us and our society… not necessarily for the better. Ivan Illich on Cars

Dust off those bikes and walking shoes people!