sainfoin – Peacock Orchard

Bees- costing way more, way more quickly than expected

Our bees are doing great. Really great. So great we’ve already had to purchase 3 additional boxes to expand the hive. I am thankful for all of the bee food we’ve been laboriously planting all these years as it’s made bee keeping a breeze. Well, except for how bee like my bees are being.

It turns out my bees really could care less about where they build their comb. My hive has foundation in the first two boxes and I have a lot of cross comb and burr comb happening. I was opening the hive every 2 weeks to cut this out but it matters not, they are still doing it. I know what you bee people are thinking. Is your hive level? Yup. Is it facing the wrong direction? Maybe. I did move it around though in the hopes it would help. It didn’t. My bees are just busy and they don’t care if I can access the hive or not.

So when I put the honey super on I took the foundation out. I really hoped that doing so would encourage the bees to build on the frame better. What did they do? Well they built their comb across every frame. Now I can’t even lift any of those frames out. What a pain!

I wanted to be a “good” bee keeper. I’m finding though, my bees think keeping away from them is as good as it gets. We aren’t planning on harvesting any honey off them anytime soon. In fact if this hive can simply be split to produce other hives, we’d be happy with that. Plus, pollinating the orchard and other plants is a huge plus!

So we are going to go into winter with a strong colony. I hope to either catch them swarming or split them next spring. Stay tuned!

Sainfoin, a perspective

We are three years into our sainfoin experiment.

The 5 acres directly behind our house is where the former owners kept their horses contained the most. It was highly compacted and had almost 0 vegetation. The sainfoin we planted here is doing well. (pictured above) It’s getting taller and it has been self seeding. It is a wall of pink blossoms we are blessed to stare at every day. It has been an incredible pollinator attractant.

It is slowly breaking through our compacted ground.

Areas that are not compacted, well there it’s flourishing. It is taller, thicker, seeding easier, where it does not have to work as hard.

This is sainfoin in a Krater.

Sainfoin in a swale.

The best growing sainfoin in what I thought was the worst faring krater.

I can’t speak to it’s palatability yet. The pigs have wandered through it and didn’t take a bite. The birds don’t seem to be interested in eating it either. I’m undecided on it as a forage. Time will tell.

Seed Collection on the Farm

Our plans for future orchard expansion now include pre-planting of Kraters far in advance of tree arrival. For this we need seeds, lots of seeds. Luckily I’ve been purchasing and tossing out seeds for ages. Collecting specimens for the new Kraters is a breeze. All you need is a bucket, some willing hands and guard dogs in case you should come upon…..well nothing, they’re useless.

So far collected specimens include: Sainfoin, sweet clover, alfalfa, asparagus, various grasses, bachelors button, vetch, various other clover varieties and odd plants I find along the way and simply throw into the bucket. Those plants include flowers, herbs and vegetable seeds. We’ll see what happens to grow from this cacophony of seeds. I’m hoping everything.

I’m feeling pretty good about this move. As I’ve said in a previous post, things aren’t working quite right as they are now. I think a big step is preparing the kraters ahead of planting. I have every hope it will make a big difference. Only time shall tell.

Beauty Abounds

Our property is in bloom. So many blooms I can’t even fit them all in one post. We have the usual alfalfa and sweet clover. The blooming weeds, erm, wildflowers. The beauty is everywhere but for me, it’s acutely in the plants I’ve planted myself. The acres of sainfoin blooming in all their pink glory. The cider orchard full of vetch, poppies, clover and more.

Enough talk, enjoy the beauty with me.

The sainfoin is such an object of fascination for us.

Let’s not forget the beauty in our animals either. Unfortunately only one of them would stand still long enough to get a good picture.

My glorious Prince the blackshoulder peacock.

Sainfoin as a Dry land Forage

Last year when we planted sainfoin I thought we’d have four foot tall greenery in no time. That didn’t happen. Still, I’m finding sainfoin to be a fascinating plant. We heavily planted on 4 acres but I threw seeds everywhere. They are in the Kraters, berms, cider orchard and randomly about.

The interesting thing about this random tossing of seeds is that they have grown a bit differently depending on their location. The sainfoin planted in the field has not grown terribly tall (dealing with extreme compaction). It has branched out more though.

The sainfoin on the berm has grown quite tall and thick (very loose soil).

I’m going to continue to enjoy watching these plants grow.

Sainfoin- An experiment still in progress

If you had asked me last year what I thought of our sainfoin experiment I would have told you it was a failure. A walk along the property today has proven otherwise. The sainfoin, It’s ALIVE! Right now it is the same size as last years seedlings. It has a million more leaves though.

I could be wrong, maybe it’s the size of them making me think this, but I swear there are more plants as well.

well it’s hard to see each plant but there are 6 plants in this frame. Last year I would have expected to see 2.

Our ground is awful, as you can see. I’m excited to see what difference the sainfoin makes of this mess. It’s coming up in all the cracks from what I see. Sainfoin does love dry. Dry is what we have.

I was assisted in todays sainfoin adventure by my plant scout and all around bossy photographer.

I was hindered by the girl who refuses to walk this much. So much. Wagon AND stroller much. Sigh