week three gardening/composting

For my hour this week, I spent some time apple harvesting, composting at Rockridge, planting a few new plants, and weeding.

Building up and protecting soil

From the Scoop on Dirt, I was interested by the origins of the word dirt. I never knew that dirt came from the word drit which means excrement... Unpleasant but interesting! It is so cool that up to nine million microbes can be in only one gram of soil. It's incredible that American's erode about 3.5 tons of soil every year.

Next time i'm in my garden I will look to see how many worms I can count while I'm working.

This article made me question how many tons of soil the average Canadian erodes annually. I also wonder what it would look like if we were to look at a sample of dirt under a microscope. It must look so cool with all those organisms in it!

Growing Garlic

From the Garlic Planting Guide I was interested to read that there is enough variation in climate from altitude, distance from the sea, and mountains to cause changes in reliability in garlic plants. It was interesting that this article mention rotted compost as well as general garden fertilizer. I would have thought one of the two would be enough. I also thought it was interesting that you can tell approximately when to harvest the garlic by how the foliage.

Next time I'm in the garden I will look to see if any of the root vegetables in the garden are beginning to rot or if they look nice and healthy.

My biggest questions after reading this is which garlic will work best and which will we like the most in our garden.

Week 2 Gardening

I harvested some carrots and potatoes for part of our dinner. I also picked all the tomatoes that had gotten ripe since last time I harvested

Here was a section of the garden before I started work.

This is the same section of garden after an hour of weeding.

Planting Winter Crops

West Coast Seeds guide to Winter Crops in BC interested me when I saw how much of a variety there can be in winter from our own gardens. It was interesting to see the different types of row coverings there are for winter. Also how the row covers can increase the temperature under them by 5 degrees! That's quite a difference in Vancouver weather. I never realized how much planning truly goes into a successful full-year garden. Every starting of all the plants has to been known in advance.

Next time I'm in the garden I will pay attention to what plants are beginning to die now that the weather is changing, and what plants are still healthy.

This made me wonder how many of the plants listed in the article can be grown in similar climates that are either a little cooler or a little hotter. It would be interesting to know how much variation they can take. I also wonder out of all of the winter crops, which is the most successful?

WILL THE CANADIAN WHEAT BOARD BE DISMANTLED?

In the news article discussing the Canadian Wheat Board, I was interested to read that about 56 percent of eligible farmers voted in the plebiscite for the Canadian Wheat Board, however there is difficulty to get that many voters out for federal elections! I'm also interested to read that the federal government will continue with it's decision making based on their political mandate rather than taking into account the recent plebiscite. Jack Wilkinson's comment was very interesting. He made a good point. With 10 billion people that need to be fed, we need a strong agriculture system. Having just been to Africa this past summer, I am a witness to how much usable land there is there that is being wasted or ignored.

Next time I'm in the garden, I will look to see how much of the food I am growing there is going to waste and how efficiently the space is used.

This article made me wonder how Lemieux plans on using technology and science for a technology that has been used for millions of years. I can understand how there may be some benefits to being able to map out a plan with a computer. But when it comes down to it, farming is farming. I also ask why the government is so blatantly ignoring the results of the plebiscite instead of working with it?

First week garden pictures

This week I spent 35 minutes at Rockridge doing the composting from around the school. I also spent 25 minutes in my backyard garden harvesting tomatoes and other vegetables as well as weeding.

Bee Foraging Behaviour

While watching the fifth assignment from week one, "Bee Foraging", i was interested to have get perspective through how the bee sees. Compared to some animals they have fairly good vision, although compared to others it's quite bad. It's very cool that bees communicate through a kind of dance. Who knew that a dance could tell where, how far, and what will be at a certain place. It's very interesting that not only do bees have their own internal clock, but they also have an internal odometer measured by fuel consumption and an internal compass.

Next time I'm in the apiary or the garden, I'm going to look for a bee doing a sort of dance to tell the others where the best place to go forage is.

This article makes me wonder why the bees sting the forager bee to death if they don't tell the hive all the information they need from it. I also wonder how they make the special sound that is their version of asking for more information.

Other Hive Designs

In the video from the fourth assignment for the first two weeks, "Overview of Top Bar Hives", the first thing I noticed was that the beekeeper tapped the top of the bars with the end of his knife. I'm very curious as to why he did that. Does it have an affect on the bees? I was intrigued by the fact that top bar hives need less smoke than the langstroth hive. It was interesting that there were brood patterns and honey stores on the same bar.

Next time I am in the apiary I will look for the differences between the langstroth hives and the top bar hives such as the ones from this film.

Langstroth Hive Design

One element from the "Basic Components of the Langstroth Bee Hive" design video that I found interesting is that there are certain aspects of the hive that you can change (such as the number of deeps/medium deeps) and the bees are not affected but other aspects (such as the size of the cone foundations) can cause problems. It's interesting that this video says the bees store the honey above the eggs and the larva, however I seem to recall that when we were looking at the cone foundations last week in the west van hives, the honey and larva where relatively interspersed. I found it intriguing that the bees don't seem to mind what material is used in the hives even though some materials are not natural such as the metal top that keeps out rain.

Next time I'm in the apiary I will pay extra attention to the placement of the honey verses the eggs and larva to see if what the video says about the storing of honey in the higher deeps is accurate.

It makes me wonder what other designs (other than the top bar design) would work better or worse as an alternative hive. I'm also curious as to why the man in this video used shorter "medium deeps" instead of the bigger normal deeps.

Bee Lifecycle

In the second article, The Life Cycle of a Bee, I found it interesting that the egg has such a structured four days. It is straight, then bent, then on it's side, and then hatches into a larva. Another thing that I found very interesting was the colour of the young adult bees. I thought bees were all the same in colouring, however this article taught me that new adults are light in colour and greyish. I also found it very fascinating that bees have such organized roles for their different ages such as how until the approximate age of 21 days they stay in the hive and only then do they become field bees.

Next time I'm in the apiary I will look to see what day the egg is at by its position. I'll also try to identify the different roles the worker bees play in and out of the hive, whether it's in the garden or in the apiary.

This article made me curious as to how the bees know when they have to change jobs and how to do their new job.

I also wonder how bees evolved to be so efficient and if they once worked differently as a hive.

Bee Yard Safety

From the first reading, Some Basic Bee Yard Safety Tips, the first thing that stood out to me was the fact that not only does black truly aggravate bees, but white actually calms them. I also was unaware (until reading this article) that bees get upset over so many things such as the smell of caffeine or sweat, the weather, and that they can track CO2. One of the most interesting elements was the advice to have a banana on-hand incase of a sting. I thought it was very cool that just eating a banana would help replenish your potassium store after creating anti-bodies against the sting.

Next time I go into the garden or apiary I will make a point of being aware of the weather and looking for a different attitude of the bees depending on if it's sunny or cloudy and cold.

This article has made me wonder what other scents offend the bees that we are unaware of and what unknown aspects could calm them more. With the list of handy things to have on-hand, I also wonder what type of natural medicines were used on bee stings prior to modern medicines.