Sunday, April 19, 2015

Sunday Reading - Finally Catching Up





It rained pretty much all day today again. When I checked at sundown we were sitting at a little over 2 inches of rain for the day.

I used the opportunity to finally get my work shop into some semblance of organization. The grass is mostly caught up although I missed a few trimming spots. The new posts are settling nicely with this rain, the ewes have all had their lambs and now it is time to get at least three new hive bottoms and tops knocked out. In order to do that I had to get the shop picked up and switched from reloading configuration to wood working configuration. I also needed to get the half ton of screws, nails, bolts and staples put up out of the way.

Believe it or not I got the place looking more or less respectable and thought I could actually get started on the hive parts this afternoon when I sat down at my low work table and put two new ends on a 100 foot extension cord that's been laying in the shop all Winter. I then decided to design and start building a three point carryall I been giving some thought to.

The carryall is actually, kinda a bee keeping related project anyway. I been thinking I needed a light carryall for the tractor to use for the back hives when it is too wet to get in there with my pickup. I looked into buying one but decided I really didn't need something to carry that much weight and at that price right now when I can build one with scraps I got laying around. It may shake apart with use after a while but right now free is looking pretty good. I also got two swarm traps out in my neighbor's fields that I can only get too by tractor if it is wet as well.

Another words I was procrastinating about getting started on bee hive stuff and I am not sure why. A couple of times I just stood in the open doorway and watched the rain fall on the freshly mowed grass and Alfalfa field. It was really quite peaceful and pleasant since I wasn't feeling all frustrated at not being able to get things done for a change. I think if I can finish up this carryall project quickly I will be happy for a rainy day or two now that I had a few days of good conditions. Being rained out day after day is just so frustrating.

The (hopefully) official tally on the lambs is 27, 14 boys and 13 girls. We had no ewe fatalities and only one still born lamb although one ewe will never be bred again after this year. Too bad to because she had triplets almost every year. Two of our other older ewes also only had singles this year. This is the first year of singles in a while too. My guess is the older girls are moving out of their prime now. The retirement flock will more than likely keep growing at this point. We still have two lambs to band, tag and shoot and then that duty is done fort he year as well.

I may just get enough time back now to get my bees taken care of properly before swarm season get's kicked into gear.

Keep Prepping Everyone!!!!!




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