March, 2010:

We now have 2 healthy hives of bees, with Matt doing a wonderful job as farm beekeeper, in his space gear.

Our shared philosophy is one of organic, minimal disturbance, natural beekeeping. Bees are an important part of the local ecosystem, and as such we value them and their pollinating activities greatly. Any honey that we might be able to steal from them (after their own needs are more than adequately covered) is a bonus. As is the anti-arthritis effects of the occasional sting.

Matt has replaced the floors of the hives with metal screens, so that evidence of varoa mites is easily seen, and is regularly dusting the bees with icing sugar (ordinary white sugar ground here in a flour mill – as icing sugar in shops often contains unwanted chemicals). This encourages the bees to clean themselves more vigorously, which helps keep the mite numbers down.

We are also working towards eliminating foundation sheets in the hives, presently only giving them starter strips, so that the bees build their own wax from scratch. The theory is that this also helps with varroa mites, as the bees make smaller cells, and hatch before the mites do. And we feel it is generally healthier to do things as naturally as possible, trying to avoid any commercial materials, such as foundation, that might contain unwanted additives that could harm the colony.

They certainly seem healthy.

In the last couple of weeks we have had two swarms turn up on the farm – seemingly attempting to take over one of our hives! This was such an experience, the air completely full of bees, which then settled onto a willow tree (both times). Although Matt did manage to get the bees into a hive, the swarm didnt stay.

Tom, who was visiting took these amazing photos. Cheers Tom.

Where vegetables are concerned, if you are buying it from a shop the nutritional value is but a tiny percentage of what food should be.
There ain’t nothing so healthy and health giving, tasty and nutritious, fresh and flavoursome as home grown vegetables, picked directly from you garden only minutes before you eat it.

And it just makes sense. Lettuces for instance could be grown by almost anybody, anywhere – perhaps even in trays on your windowsill. Supermarket lettuces may have been sprayed 20 times with various poisonous things, grown hydroponically, using massive amounts of water and oil-derived energy, and then transported half way round the world. Farm workers are paid a pittance, water tables are depleted, supermarkets and other corporate chronies are enriched and empowered even more, and traditional old heirloom varieties (specifically suited to place, weather and people) disappear – to mention just a few of the problems caused by the global market in food.

Its all very well campaigning against environmental destruction, or moaning about the power of global corporations, or the poor quality of food these days, or the increasing cost of living but one small thing that we can all do to counter these things is to start on the path of growing food for ourselves. Once you start you may well find that it escalates and you just can’t stop. Gardening is massively addictive!

At a guess, I would say that we produce 50% of our food – which increases substantially in the summer months when the gardens are jam packed full of amazing tasty delights. Each year as the soil in our raised beds improves (with the regular addition of compost, manure and woody matter) we see our work decrease and the results increase. This winter we have been able to pick leeks, lettuce, beetroots, chard, parsley continuously.

And the asparagus, brussels sprouts and broccolli that have recently been adorning our plates are outstanding!

In between the rain showers over the last week, we have been planting lots of seeds and seedlings. Its that time of year again, and it looks like frosts are over.

Some of the first seeds, that we planted in trays, sprouted quickly and have now been transplanted into the straw and horse manure covered beds in the gardens. The courgettes were each planted in a generous bucket of nutritious compost from the heap.

A second set of tomato seedlings have gone in, purchased at Tabua market, after the first lot were killed by a late frost.

Sophie has been saving milk cartons to plant seeds in, and we found some old polystyrene fish boxes last year which make great little home made nursery with an old window.

We have also almost finished pruning and tying-in all the vines, including some that have lived without posts for a few years.

After torrential downpours yesterday we woke to glorious sunshine and the sound of the first cuckoo – 21st March and spring is here!

If we can make it ourselves we will…and that most definately includes stuff for the kids.  Fridays round here finds ‘little ladies that lunch’, some of us ex-pat mums who get together to let the kids hang out while we catch up.  A couple of weeks ago we made playdough and it was a big success.

Playdough Recipe (enough for one child, multiply for more)

1 Cup flour

1 Cup water

half Cup salt

1 tablespoons cream of tartar

2 tablespoons cooking oil

1 teaspoons food colouring

couple drops essential oil for pleasant smell if you wish

Mix the dry ingredients and then stir in the oil, colouring and water.  Cook over a medium heat, stirring well continuously.  A ball will gradually form and then take it off the stove and knead it well until it is smooth.  Then roll, squash, squeeze, cut with shapes..(and that’s just for the grown ups!)

At the quinta:

It was pretty scary listening to the wind chucking the tiles all over the place, and smashing them all around.  Some narrowly missed the windows (and one embedded itself in the window frame) – eek!

In the village:

That white thing on the left is the concrete village sign, snapped in half!

Hoorah for solar panels (luckily they didn’t blow off the roof)!

And here is my favourite photo from the storms – of the village sign which has now been propped up proudly by scaffolding planks (was it the Junta (local council) or proud villagers?) Kirsten: