Sheep shearing with the girls

Saturday at Littledove was awesome. We got to watch sheep shearing and hang out with the girls for a few hours. If all goes as expected, the six ewes will be at the farm tomorrow afternoon.

Four of the girls. As you can see, they're not particularly thrilled once they've been sheared. 

A few lessons from today's visit:

• Shearing sheep is one hard job. It involves lots of bending and repetitive motion, plus new lambs tend to lose control of their little bladders when being sheared for the first time. Not fun.
• Sitting on the ground with sheep and meeting them at eye level is a great way to get to know them. I probably sat with the girls for a couple of hours. Vita, the lead sheep, let me love on her for quite some time. I think we're going to be good friends.
• Bundling fleece and picking through it for debris takes a good eye. We can only hope one day to be as skilled as Franny and her crew are.

Shearing, hoof trimming and giving meds all happen at the same time. Those sheep in the larger photos  are part of the girls coming to the farm.

Still haven't quite come up with a flock name yet. Perhaps "Masego Shetlands." Masego's a South African name that means "blessed."

Ready for the girls

Just got a call this evening. The girls should be sheared and ready for the farm this weekend! It's exciting news. And a little scary.

We think we're ready. We've done the reading, joined online forums that talk about all things Shetland sheep, and have a small home and paddock ready. We've chosen six ewes from an exceptional established flock, and we have an amazing mentor.

But there's still so much to learn and experience. So much. That's the scary part.

Yet anything worth doing can a little scary at first. Sheep are no different. We're not experts, but we're quick learners, and we're good problem solvers. We'll undoubtedly run into bumps as we travel this new road, but we can do this.

Yes. We're ready.

Pest-infested bee hive threatens colony health

The state apiarist stopped by the farm yesterday. The prognosis: It's going to take some work to get these bees on the path to health.

A waxy moth larvae (upper left), remaining honey bees stealing honey from the invested hive ( right), and stragglers picking through the debris left by waxy moths and hive beetles.

And here's why. There's an infestation of wax moths and hive beetles. They've killed at least one adjacent abandoned hive and may be working their way toward the last one.

As you can see, the dead hive is a hot mess. It's filled with insect eggs, larvae, and debris, along with bees and ants robbing the hive for its honey.

Wax moths spell disaster for honey bees. The moths enter the hive at night and lay their eggs. A healthy hive can expel the eggs. A weak one, however, will be overrun. The eggs hatch, then the larvae decimate the hive, eating the honey, pollen, wax and bee brood.  The hive then dies since the queen can't produce new workers.

Hive beetles attack in much the same way wax moths do. The beetles lay eggs inside the hive, and their larvae eat their way through cells of honey comb. The honey ferments, rots, and then the bees abandon the hive.

Wax moth eggs infest an abandoned beehive.

It's unclear which happened first, the wax moths or the hive beetles. We also don't know how healthy the remaining bees are. We can hear them buzzing, and there seems to be a lot of hive activity, but the covers were glued so tightly with honey we couldn't open it. The hive may be healthy. It may have the beginnings of infestation. We just don't know yet.

What we do know is that finding both these pests poses a serious risk to the remaining hive's health and to any other bee hives nearby. But we can do a couple of things to improve the leftover hive's chances of survival.

Removing the infestation.

One thing will be to move the active hive to a different location.  The state apiarist suggested moving the bees to a sunny location, where moths will be discouraged from hanging around the hive. That hive will also have its lid pried opened so its health can be checked.  Guess that means we're going to have to invest in bee gear a little sooner than anticipated.


Another's pretty obvious--clean out the infestation. Now that's going to be a nasty job. Hive beetles and wax moths leave a sticky residue plus feces, pupae casings...nasty.  But we're on it. The infested hive's been disassembled and left to sit in the sun to kill some of the pests' larvae. Then we'll have to remove any remaining honey, clean the box and frames, and then heat or freeze the box and frames. That last step will kill any eggs left in crevices.

So that's the scoop on the bees. It's not a good situation, but if we're able to get things turned around, these little workers should become a healthy, thriving colony. Keep your fingers crossed it all works!

Tilling time

Almost an acre of ground got tilled today, and it's all going to the 2013 garlic crop! That's enough ground for about 200 pounds of garlic seed, give or take, plus special sections for bulbils and green garlic.

But it's not time for planting. Not yet. The mornings and evenings feel like sweater weather. Daytime temperatures, however, remain in the 70s and 80s.  If we were to plant now, the garlic would get too much top growth that would eventually die off in winter.


Instead we'll plant a quick cover crop of buckwheat.  Buckwheat helps suppress weeds, plus it releases nitrogen into the soil as it decomposes. That makes it a great "green manure." The buckwheat will grow about three weeks. Then it'll get plowed under and mixed with a nice layer of composted horse manure. We'll probably add some Greensand, too, to help break up our clay soil.

A field of buckwheat at the farm.

Then we'll be ready to plant come late October.  It takes work to grow big, healthy garlic on a commercial scale, but the end results are worth it. There's nothing more satisfying for a garlic grower than harvesting beautiful bulbs that were the fruits of a nine-month labor of love.

Even bees need a little love

Garlic farmers, beginning shepherds, and now, another moniker: beekeepers.

Yep, apparently that's us. Beekeepers.

The honey bees come from an abandoned beehive in one of the back pastures.   The hive spent this summer--when temperatures soared over 100 degrees for weeks--covered in tall Johnson grass. Then there was the drought. How these bees survived those harsh conditions is anyone's guess. But they did.

Anything with that much of a desire to live deserves a chance to thrive, especially since bees are becoming endangered as a species. That's where we come into the picture. We're now reading up on caring for bees, and we've got the state apiarist coming to inspect the hive. He should be able to identify any problems plus give some sound advice on how to increase honey production. A sound hive should be able to produce 50 pounds of honey in a given year.

Becoming beekeepers wasn't part of the operational plan. As Forrest Gump would say, you never know what you're gonna get. That's especially true with life at a farm. Keep your fingers crossed  we get a good report from the ag agent!

So many garlics...

The first signs of fall signal it's time to get ready for planting.  By now we pretty much know which garlic varieties, and how much, to grow for next year.

Choosing, however, isn't easy. There's a dizzying array when it comes to garlic. Hot ones, mild ones, spicy ones, gigantic ones, small ones, striped ones, purple splotched ones, ones for hot and cold climates--over 150 varieties. And the descriptions always look so tantalizing, we sometimes want to try them all at the same time! Still, in any given year, only so much can be planted. That's true whether you're a farmer or an urban gardener.

Three bulbs of Estonian Red garlic.

This year we'll be tilling enough ground to plant 200 pounds of prime garlic seed, with areas for garlic bulbils and green garlic. We'll be planting large quantities of some of the favorites we grew this year, such as Khabar, Georgian Crystal, Inchelium Red, Siberian, Estonian Red--a very rare garlic that, in the right conditions, can grow to almost baseball size--and Chesnok Red. Plus we'll be trying a few new varieties, like German Extra Hardy. Our German Extra Hardy seed stock comes from a local grower, and it's got some serious size on it.

The fun starts next week with preparation for planting, if everything goes according to plan. We'll keep you posted on how things go. 

Goodbye to summer?

Summer officially ends September 21, but don't tell Mother Nature. She seems to think it's fall already.

For the last week or so, we've been seeing signs of fall here in the Bluegrass--cool early mornings in the 50s, tobacco in the fields turning golden as it nears harvest, pitch-black nights at 8:30 p.m. Now this: a ripe hickory nut. 

We usually don't see ripe hickory nuts until late September at the earliest. 

All these little signs let us know planting's just around the corner. Where does the time go....

New girls coming to the farm

The moorit Shetland ewe on the left with the white face markings is Orly.  That's mom in the front.

We're picking up some new girls, with names like Orly, Pandora, Vita and Helena. No, they're not characters from Greek mythology. They're six registered Shetland ewes coming to the farm in about a week.

Shetland sheep will make a nice addition to the farm. They'll help keep down grasses, and there's no better natural fertilizer and soil enrichment than organic sheep manure.

We've been preparing for their arrival for months.  Books on caring for sheep? Check. Sheep minerals and feed for sheep? Check. Winter hay and bedding? Check. Food-grade diatomaceous earth for organically managing intestinal parasites? Check. A few things, like the permanent barn, are works in progress that should be completed by winter. But we're ready.

Fine fleece from one of the Shetland ewes coming to the farm. It felt soft and luxurious.  

The ewes are coming from Littledove Farm, a local farm that's produced Shetlands for wool and meat for nearly two decades. Franny, who owns Littledove, has been a godsend. She hand-picked our starter flock, and more important, showed us how to manage sheep without running ourselves--or the girls--ragged.  When done right, raising Shetlands should be a calm, orderly process, with sheep that live long, productive lives.  We like that.

For the first few weeks, the girls will probably spend most of their time in the main paddock. This will give them a chance to settle into their new home and get familiar with us. Then they'll eventually go into managed paddocks during the day and return to the main area at night. They'll be on a schedule so they know when to go out and when to come back home.

We'll be sharing more stories about the girls. Right now, we're trying to figure out a flock name to register with North American Shetland Sheep Association.  If you've got any suggestions, or if you raise sheep, we'd love to hear from you!

Vita, a two-year-old Shetland ewe coming to the farm in about a week.  That's Tom in the background. 

Big Garlic Flavor Comes From Small Bulbs

A big clove from a small purple stripe garlic bulb. 

It's true: Size doesn't matter, at least not when it comes to cooking and heirloom gourmet garlic.

Small heirloom bulbs can yield garlic cloves as thick as your thumb or thicker. And those cloves are packed full of garlic flavor. We know some professional chefs who prefer smaller garlic bulbs because they believe the flavor's more intense and concentrated.

Thick garlic cloves from the small bulb shown in the background.

We use cloves from small bulbs when we cook at the farm, and we sell them, too, as culinary garlic. We also plant cloves from smaller bulbs to grow as green garlic.

Don't get us wrong--we love growing big garlic bulbs. They're wonderful for seed. But good things really do come in small packages. And when it comes to cooking, that includes heirloom gourmet garlic.