· By Angela Seto
Stuck in Saskatoon for now
Our creamed honey getting stirred in the creaming machine.
What's new on the farm:
Well, today's the day that the bees should be heading out to Vancouver Island!
But, we found out on Friday that our driver's truck motor is fried and needs fixing.
We are now on hold until he is roadworthy again.
It's a bit stressful because timing is important when you're moving hundreds of hives at a time.
We have all our hives sitting at our honey yard, ready to be stacked and loaded onto the truck.
But now that they aren't going for a few days, that's a lot of bees in one spot for longer than we'd like.
If the weather remains chilly and windy, the bees will stay in their hives, which is what we want.
But if the weather is warm and sunny, the bees will start to fly around.
Honeybees are excellent at directions and orientation. When they leave their hives for the first time, they take a look at the landmarks around them and where the sun is.
With that information, they lock in their location.
They can head out for kilometers and return to the same hive each time.
They are so locked into that spot, that if you moved the hive a few hundred feet away, the bees would still return to the old spot and wonder where their home went.
You should move them a few kilometers away so the area looks totally new, and they have to figure out where they are again.
In normal situations, hives are spread out and placed at different angles to each other so locations are unique to each hive.
But when we have the hives all in the home yard, ready to be stacked, they are placed in straight rows close together.
The bees could get confused when they leave the hive because the entrances all look similar.
This is called "drifting" because bees can drift from one hive to another.
It’s a problem because some hives can end up with a lot of bees, while others lose bees and get too small.
We don't want the hives to become imbalanced because strong populations are important for bees to survive the winters.
To help avoid this problem, Andrew and the crew placed random tools, buckets, and pallets around the hives. This gives the bees different landmarks to recognize and find their way back.
The bee yard is looking a little kooky now, but there is method to its madness!
And fortunately, this week the weather is also going to be cold and wet.
Now we sit and wait until the truck gets back in action and can pick our bees up!
In the Kitchen
We are 4 days away from getting our new kitchen!
Everyone is excited to move, as we are pretty cramped in our current spot.
Right now we can only have 2 people working at a time. Primarily, one person is making caramel or packaging honey, and one person is packing orders.
But we need room to label the jars, sort and pack the caramels into boxes, pump honey, package gift sets, prepare shipping labels and customs forms, and so forth.
Between 7 of us, we all work odd hours throughout the day and weekends to get everything done each week.
In the new space, there will be room for all of us to work at the same time!
The first step in the new space will be some renovations and electrical work, before we can move.
The timing is a bit crazy with holiday markets, the bee move, and the holiday season coming up, but that's how things turn out sometimes!
Pickled Red Onions with Honey
I'm no canner (yet), but I love quick pickling.
Pickled red onions are a staple in our house. We throw them on tacos, hamburgers, sandwiches, salads, or eat them on their own.
Whenever I see a pickling recipe made with sugar, I automatically swap it with honey.
When the quantity of sugar is under 1 cup, I keep a 1:1 substitution of sugar to honey.
The best part is that it only takes 10 minutes to make, and you don't have to continually collect mountains of glass jars from buying pickled veggies all the time!
Ingredients:
- 1 large red onion
- 2 cups white vinegar
- 2 cups water
- ⅓ cup honey
- 2 tablespoons sea salt
Directions:
- Thinly slice the red onions and pack them into a glass jar.
- Add vinegar, water, honey, and sea salt to a small saucepan and heat it on medium heat for 1-2 minutes, until the honey and salt dissolve.
- Cool slightly and then pour the brine into the jar over the onions, making sure all the onions are submerged.
- Close the jar and let it cool to room temp, then move to the fridge.
- The onions will be ready once they are bright pink and soft (approx 1 hour).
- These will keep in the fridge for 2 weeks.
Recipe taken from Love and Lemons.