This And That

We have had nothing but rain lately - way too much rain!  We are getting a little reprieve from the soaking today, but the weathermen say that tonight will be more rain.   My gardens are already swamps.  It will be a long while before I can get into them to do weeding.  Hopefully the newly planted seeds of lettuce and spinach and herbs have not been washed away.   We also got a little hail the other night.  But fortunately I only lost a few tomatoes and cabbages.  It could have been much worse!  The garden on the sloped part of the yard isn't as bad as the one on the flat part of the yard, but it is still swampy.

This is the swampy garden needing much weeding.  Lost a few green beans; potatoes are growing in the back of the garden.

The sloped garden is faring much better.  Everything sure is green!

We have lost our apple trees, I think.  Our Honeycrisp apple tree is only twigs this year with a few sparse leaves.   I think it was a victim of winter sunscald, and spring root rot from all the rains.   The other tree which gave us great Prairie Spy apples last year has some kind of disease.   The blossoms never made it, the leaves are soft and rotting, and the ends of the branches are easily broken.  Any apple experts out there who can tell me what is wrong?   We will give the good tree another year, but I fear it is gone.   There are no apples growing on it this year.

As you can see, the Honeycrisp tree never made it. 

The branches are nearly bare with just a few small leaves. 

Even our good tree has soft leaves, no fruit and easily breakable ends on the branches.

The bees are doing well, though!  We had to feed them a lot of sugar syrup during the week of rains, but today they are out getting what they can.  We are starting with 10 hives this year.  

If you look closely, you can see 3 or 4 bees coming into the hive.  (Click on photo to see larger view)

Birdsfoot Trefoil, one of the bees' favorite flowers!

I had a long conversation the other day with a fellow from the power company.  He was contracted to spray under the power lines for the electric company, and we had asked the county to call us before they do any spraying because we are beekeepers.   The county contracted a fellow to spray for "noxious weeds" and he was letting us know.  I told him we didn't want any sprays!!  Those "noxious weeds" are wildflowers and bee food!  We talked at length about the problem of bees dying in this country (colony collapse disorder), and to his credit, he was a little savvy and sympathetic on that subject.  He said the power company was really more concerned about small trees being allowed to grow under power lines and that was the reason for the spraying.  In the end, we agreed that instead of spraying he would come out and use a cutter in the fall to cut the vegetation.    I guess many farms that are certified organic, and beekeepers, too, do NOT want spraying done.  So we get to keep our bee food, and in late Sep or early Oct, they will come out and cut things under the lines.  At least that way, the wildflowers will be allowed to put on seeds, which will fall to the ground and come up again in the spring.  Noxious weeds indeed!!!!   Those flowers are food for the bees!!!  I can see their point in not wanting young trees to grow under the lines, but wildflowers will never grow that tall.  I told the guy, why don't they just cut instead of spray anyway?  Do we really need all those chemicals on our land? I think I will have to write my state congress people about this spraying thing.....