New trees, new pasture, rain and a 4-wheel drive lesson

Last weekend I was excited to bring home 3 native trees/shrubs from the Missouri Prairie Foundation annual sale at the City Market in Kansas City. The sale is continuing this coming weekend, too. But I am doing everything I can to control the urge to buy more until I've planted what I already have.

Lucky for me, I was able to pre-order my plants from Eric Lovelace at the Forrest Keeling Nursery. He had everything I was looking for. And pre-ordering meant there was very little time to shop and bring home more - at least not many more (I only bought 9 little ones). The three trees I bought were a White Fringe Tree, an American Smoke Tree and an Ozark Witch Hazel. And I got them into the truck and headed home just before the first downpour of the weekend started.

Ozark Witch Hazel waiting to be planted.

We had also made some plans to take our non-functioning riding lawn mower to a guy across town the same day. He had a working rider that could use our leaf bagger AND would give us some trade-in for our old mower. So I was anxious to get the mower in the trailer, hooked up to the truck and out of the tall grass that was rapidly enveloping it.

Unfortunately, I needed a lesson in patience (and the limits of 4-wheel drive in mud).

I got Old Blue good and stuck in the mud :-(

Needless to say, the mower didn't go anywhere. Until today, that is. The downpours ended overnight and Brent was able to get the truck unstuck on Sunday. Today (Tuesday) he was able to take the riding mower to a local small engine repair shop. With any luck, they will have the old mower working by May 1st. Meanwhile, we have a push mower, two scythes…and alpacas!

The boys got the opportunity to munch on some really luscious new pasture as the weather cleared on Sunday. Brent had the great idea to create a little temporary pasture for them (we needed to buy more wire, anyway) and use them as mowers. So we created a walk gate in the fence between the water hydrant and the west barn door for them to walk through. Just outside the gate is a dog run and also a lot of old junk (like an entire waterbed, and fence panels and car parts) left by the previous owners. I'm hoping to use the area for a chicken yard but all that junk makes it nearly impossible to mow. So we placed t-posts and attached 100' of new wire fence around the grass-covered junk. And we let the boys have the run of it!

Our alpacas checking out the fresh grass - notice Ace in the upper right getting ready to roll.

I've never seen our alpacas so obviously excited. Nor was I aware until then how much they enjoy destroying small trees. The baby elm and Bradford pear trees in their new area were no match for their antics. The boys attacked them with delight. They walked over them, chewed and chest butted them until they broke. Then they ate the leaves. The boys were also swinging their heads on their long, skinny necks through the grass, apparently, to make sure there were no animals in there. Then they would cush and roll around on their backs. Like I said, they were very animated, obviously enjoying their new spot.

Loki (the white one) pretty much engulfed in grass.
He had already rolled and is now burying his nose in the goodness of the fresh food.

By Tuesday, the junk that had been overgrown by grass was mostly exposed. By this weekend, we should be able to clean the junk out of the area and mow. Pretty impressive work by our not-so-fuzzy boys!

Shearing Day

Yesterday our fluffy tough-boys got their annual haircuts. It was shearing day.

7:30 a.m. started with careful, cautious haltering in our half-finished barn

Things progressed rapidly for our boys. They were first on the schedule at Manna Meadows, the alpaca ranch near us that hosted the event. Brent and I started early to get the boys haltered and loaded in the trailer that our friends at the host farm loaned us for the journey. We arrived at Manna Meadows by 8:30.

Shearers are NOT cautious in getting the boys onto the mats so they can do their work.

Next thing the alpacas know, they are being pulled out of the trailer, picked up and plopped down on their side to be stretched with pulleys and ropes tied to their feet. It all happens very quickly.

Me working with Brian Heimes of Manna Meadows to bag Loki's blanket
as Brian of Shear Relief does the shearing.

Two teams worked to bag the fiber. We used 3 different bags to keep the blanket, neck and "3rds" separate. It was a pretty smooth system and the shearers worked very well together, shifting seamlessly between two stations. Each alpaca was sheared in less than 10 minutes.

Here's Loki looking slim and trim after the shearing.

It's an awfully scary process for the animals (and for this alpaca "mom" who moves a lot more slowly and carefully). Similar to a semi-annual teeth-cleaning at the dentist, the quicker the better, I say, for something like this that can't be skipped. And I'm certainly glad it's done only once a year.

Here's a before and after of "Walt" that shows pretty clearly how much fiber these guys grow for protection from the elements over the season.

Walt before shearing.

Walt after shearing (with Ace looking on)

Sharon and Brian at Manna Meadows are simply awesome to host this in their facility near us and to guide us through this somewhat stressful process. At least one other alpaca owner was there with her small group. There was a lot of camaraderie and fun in the day - and pizza for lunch (my favorite food). It was hard to convince these hard-working shearers to stop. But after shearing nearly 50 alpacas and with the arrival of food, they took a break.

Taking a little lunch break before shearing the 20+ remaining alpacas.

In the end, we all made it back home safe and sound and a lot wiser to the shearing process. Some of us came home a lot thinner - and some of us full of pizza and knowledge. All of us were very tired by the end of the day.

These guy missed out on the pizza - obviously.

And now we have seven 30-gallon bags of fiber. Our next step: learn how to skirt the fiber for shipping out to the processing facility.

Bees, bees, bees…and asparagus

A close-up of the bees in their "package"

Well, I'm a beekeeper now. The bees finally arrived on Saturday after a freezing Friday night. The post office called me at 6:18 a.m. and I showed up to get them at 7:15. I had no idea what to expect - except what I had seen on the numerous videos I had watched to learn what the heck I was supposed to do to get them into the hives.

I had taken the day off on Friday because the USPS tracking said my 4 packages (2 for each hive) were expected to arrive that day. So I spent the day making sugar syrups for the new bees to live on until the flowers start blooming. Then I "prepped" the hives by putting beeswax on the top bars and set them up on their benches in the apiary. The post office called Friday at around 3:45 to say they wouldn't be coming until Saturday. And I was a little relieved.

They arrived early in the morning and it was still cold. So I waited until 4:00 p.m. to install them (because the videos said they would be ready to settle down in the late afternoon). But, having watched them for a few days now, I think I should have waited until even later - or installed them in the morning when it was cold.

I didn't do a very good job getting the first batch of bees into their hive. But it helped me learn a lot that was helpful for the second batch. For instance, that can of food, it's hard to get out. You should do that first - to both boxes.

Getting the food can out of the box was incredibly hard.

After the can finally came out, I pulled out the queen cage and saw that she was alive. Her little cage has 2 corks - one in each end. After removing one of those, I placed her cage into the hive. Then it was time to dump in the bees. First, I hit the box on the ground to make bees fall onto the floor of the package. Next, I began shaking them out of the opening, pouring them over the queen cage. And I repeated that a couple of times.

Dumping the bees into their home - and banging the sides to get them to fall.

At that point bees are starting to come out of the box and fly around. It was hard to be focused with all that buzzing. But it seemed like I was about done and I replaced the bars in the top box and started to put the sugar syrup feeder on top. Then I turned and noticed the second box. Darn. So I kinda botched the first install. With all those bees flying out of the hive now, I had to try to get that stubborn can out of the second box. Needless to say, a lot of the first group had to find their own way back into the hive because I didn't get things closed up quickly - at all.

Like I said, I learned a lot. The second hive got a lot more bees into it and I was a lot less nervous. But I did get one bee sting when I installed that second hive. And I learned that with a lot of disoriented bees around, it's smart to stay on your feet. I got stung on my knee when I knelt down and crushed one of the little ladies accidentally.

It's been 3 days now. And, upon checking this evening, it looks like all the bees that were hanging onto the outside of the hive have found their way in. And bees are busily coming and going at the hive entrance - like they work there or something :-)

Whew! that was a big job. My next task is to retrieve that queen cage - maybe on Thursday or Friday.

Asparagus in their cinderblock raised beds.

Meanwhile, Brent spent the day building some super-cool raised beds for the asparagus crowns I bought a couple of weeks ago. He also made 2 trips back to Shawnee to pick up the pulverized topsoil that fills the beds - and shoveled it into the beds. It's really no wonder we are sore and achy on Monday.

The asparagus beds span the entire south side of the house. We planted 50 crowns in over 50 feet of raised beds. It will take a year, but we should have plenty. And the fronds from the spears we don't harvest will make a pretty screen for the ground level windows.

It's all slowly (and sometimes suddenly) coming together…

…and we have BEES!