Thursday, April 18, 2013

Raised beds. Progress report.

Iris raised bed. Growing nicely.Potatoes. Barrel, technically not a raised bed, but close enough.Onions, shallots, garlic, chinese chives. Very pleased.Various vegetables, bok choy, chinese cabbage, lettuce, beets, swiss chard, minimal snow pea growth, and odds and ends.

What's blooming?

Amanogawa cherry. This was bought as a close-out overwintered outdoors at the nursery. Turned out nice.  Pain, neuropathy, and fatigue are keeping me from doing much but I can take photos. I think the bees are flying past a neighbor's feral sweet cherry, much larger and many more flowers, for the Amanogawa.Asian pear.Bleeding heart.Cherry garden iris. This was also a close-out last summer. Diminutive. The first to bloom for me.Little columnar apple tree.Montmorency cherry. I moved this from Vancouver to Battleground last summer. Nice.Scilla.

Spring Photo 2014

Each year we have a photo with the dogs in front of the blooming cherry tree. Ten years ago I thought the tree was on its last legs. Better now than ever.

 

Monday, April 15, 2013

Tulips

Tulips. Spring is nice.

Thursday, April 11, 2013

Beekeeping. Progress Report.

Today was 2 days after installation of the bee colony. Time to check. The main issue is removal of the queen cage. If she's in it, it's time to release her into the colony. As it turned out, the candy plug was gone. I did not poke through the colony to find her. Too much disruption in that. The way they are clustered together, I'm thinking the queen is at the center of the cluster. Hard to see due to lighting. Significant comb already made. Where do they get the energy and food to do that? I do have sugar syrup in the hive. In the morning, it was chilly and they were almost all in the hive. In the afternoon, it was warmer. I thought I saw a few foraging some dandelions. Not many. It's still chilly for foraging.