Swarming Bees

We have officially been backyard beekeepers for a year now.  It has been quite interesting.  Today was an especially interesting bee day!

I heard loud buzzing and looked outside.  There were bees flying around everywhere in our backyard!  I had never seen bees swarm before, but it was immediately apparent that that was what was happening.  Beekeepers do their best to make the hive conditions such that the bees don't feel they need to swarm, but it is fairly common for that to happen in the spring.  In preparation for swarming, the bees create a new queen and then one of the queens and about half of the bees leave to make a new home for themselves.  Swarming is not a good thing, but it is an amazing and fascinating sight.  

Luckily for us, our bees chose our blackberry bush as their temporary new home.  As you can see from the pictures, the bees cluster together and there were a lot of them.  The blackberry branches are not very thick, but the bees were a solid mass with many still on the ground and flying in the air.

Swarming bees are extremely docile since they do not have young or a home to protect.  Plus they gorge before leaving so they have enough to sustain themselves until they get established in a new location.   

Todd got an empty hive and began to literally scoop the bees by the handfuls into the hive.  If you look closely at the picture, you'll notice a handful of bees falling into the hive.

Todd then shook the branch to get the remainder of the bees to fall in. 

We hoped they'd be happy in this new home we provided for them.  We planned to move this hive to a permanent location in our yard once the bees were settled. 

With the thousands and thousands of bees we got in the new hive, we most likely did not get the queen since they all quickly left.  They returned right back to their original hive, but landed on the outside for awhile before going back in. 

Since we now knew there were probably two queens in our hive, they would swarm again soon (maybe even the next day).  We also knew it was unlikely we would be lucky enough to see where the swarm landed in order to try and catch them again, so Todd split the hive.  He divided the boxes and the bees into two different hives.  Hopefully the bees will be confused enough by their new location that they won't swarm.  They also will each have more room to expand.  Best case scenario is that we got one queen in each new hive, but if not the hive missing a queen should make a new queen for themselves.  We'll just have to wait and see what happens.

As I get this ready to post, I realize this doesn't sound or look nearly as impressive as it really was.  I was glad Todd was already on his way home when it happened, but I was bummed the kids were at school and missed it all. 

We still have a lot to learn about beekeeping, but it sure is fascinating!

Spray Fruit Trees -- NOW

Now is the time to spray your fruit trees so you aren't fighting insects on your trees or later in your harvested fruit.  You need to spray your trees when they have buds, but the buds are not yet open.  Where we live, that time is right now and will soon be too late.  Our apricot tree has already blossomed, but all the others are still perfect for spraying.  

We have had good success spraying a mixture of dormant oil, Malathion and fixed copper.  To prepare, follow the instructions per gallon for each.  Soak each tree until the spray almost runs off.  Soak the entire tree including the trunk and each branch.  Spray in the evenings so you do not harm your local bee population.  This spray will kill the bugs and eggs that are waiting to infect your tree as they come out of dormancy.  This spray is also good for raspberries, blackberries and grapes.  

Spraying your tree is definitely worth the effort.  There is nothing worse than picking beautiful fruit in the fall only to find that it is infested with little critters!

For more information on spraying dormant oil, check out the recent newsletter put out by the Utah Extension Service by clicking HERE.

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Have you sprayed yet?  When harvesting, do you wish you had?

Time to Prune

It is time to prune!  That includes fruit trees, raspberries, blackberries and grapes.
 

As a general rule for fruit trees, you want to open up the center to get light and you also want to prevent branches from criss-crossing.  Apples and pears produce fruit on last year's growth so you'll need to leave enough new growth for next year's crop.  Fruits like peaches and almonds produce fruit on this year's growth which usually results in more to cut back.  When determining what height you'd like the branches to start, keep in mind whatever height the branch is from the ground it will never get higher.  The growth of a tree is all from the top.  When deciding how tall to let your tree grow, just determine how high you want to harvest fruit.  It is important to prune every year.  If you wait too many years and try to make up for it, it may shock your tree into not producing fruit. 

For raspberries you need to determine if you have June-bearing or ever-bearing.  For ever-bearing you get fruit off this year's growth so cut all stalks about 3 inches from the ground.  For June-bearing raspberries, fruit is produced on last year's stalks so you need to cut out any stalks that produced berries last year.  

For blackberries, cut out all stalks that produced berries last year.

Good-luck on grapes.  I have no sage advice.  I just hack ours back every year and they seem to thrive.

For me, it works well to use 3 pruning tools.  A small hand held pruner is the handiest to use for most of the pruning, especially if pruning is maintained yearly.  A two-handed lopper works well for branches up to an inch and a quarter.  A pruning saw is used for anything bigger.  

For more information, check out the pruning videos done by the USU Extension Service by clicking HERE.

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Any pruning tips or pruning frustrations to share?

Dehydrating Fruit

First, let me say I LOVE my dehydrator!  This is my second harvest season with a dehydrator and it has been a big hit.  It is great to have another avenue for putting up all the fruit that seems to be coming out of our ears each fall!  I'm amazed by how many things you can actually dehydrate, but so far I have only tried a few things that we've needed preserved.  This post will share what has worked the best for us.

We had a lot of blackberries, peaches and raspberries this year, so fruit leather was the way to go.  It is so easy, not to mention yummy!

Once the fruit has been washed and any pits or bad spots removed, put the fruit in a blender with honey and lemon juice if desired.  I did use lemon juice with the peaches and some honey with all.  I do not remove the peach skins as my blender is able to puree the skins as well as the fruit.

4-5 c. blended fruit

1-2 T. honey

optional for added sweetness

1-2 tsp. lemon juice

optional to keep peaches from browning--not needed for berries

Pour the fruit puree 1/8" thick onto your dehydrator trays.  The more consistent you keep the thickness, the more evenly the fruit leather will dry.  Dehydrate at 140 degrees for several hours.  Just check on it periodically and you'll know it is done when you are able to peel it off the dehydrator sheets or trays.  If you leave it too long, it will become brittle.  The peach has more of a tendency to become brittle than the berries, especially on the edges.  Brittle pieces are still tasty and my kids had no problem eating those since they didn't roll up well for storage.  Use a pizza cutter to cut the sheets of fruit leather into serving size pieces.  Each piece can then be placed on plastic wrap and rolled up.  Store in an air-tight container.  They will keep for a year if kept in the freezer. 

 
Apples need to be made into applesauce before drying as fruit leather, so I dehydrated apple slices instead.  This was much easier, especially since I used an apple corer and peeler.  I've heard people complain that their apple corer and peelers don't work well.  I think mine works great as long as the apples are firm.  Mine is from Back to Basics.  After the apples are in slices, I sprinkle them with Fruit Fresh so they won't brown.  You can also use lemon juice.  Lay the apple slices on the dehydrator racks and dry at 140 degrees until leathery and dry to the touch.  Store in an air-tight container.  They will store for 6-9 months in a cool, dark place and even longer if kept in the freezer.

Apples don't need anything extra, but it is fun to dry a batch or two with cinnamon or Jell-O.  For cinnamon apples, simply sprinkle the apple slices with a little cinnamon before drying. 

For dried apples that basically taste like candy, coat the apple slices with Jell-O powder before drying.  You can do this by either stirring the apples and Jell-O together in a bowl or shaking them together in a gallon Ziploc bag.  Jell-O covered apples take longer to dry than plain or cinnamon apples.  Any flavor Jell-O works.  So far we've tried and had success with strawberry and raspberry flavored Jell-O.

My kids can't seem to get enough of the fruit leather and dried fruit.  The dehydrated fruit works great in their school sack lunches or as a snack.  The only problem I have is trying to keep the kids from eating the dried fruit while we still have so much fresh fruit that needs eaten!

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What do you dehydrate?  What tips do you have?  Please share!

Freezing your Harvest

There are many ways to preserve your harvest.  Lately I've been using my freezer and dehydrator more and more.  We now get enough produce that we definitely need more ways to preserve our produce than just canning.  This post has a few tips for freezing, but I'll post on dehydrating soon--promise.

When deciding how to preserve produce, consider the following:

• What will my family eat?
• What is needed in my food storage?
• How much work and time is involved?

After considering these questions, it made sense for us to freeze peaches, blackberries, raspberries and peppers.  All of these are very quick and easy to prepare for freezing--big bonus.  Plus, we already have plenty of canned peaches and various freezer jams to last throughout the year. 

Berries are so simple.  First wash them and make sure the excess water has drained through the colander.  Then spread on a jelly roll pan and place in freezer.  If you don't drain the excess water well, the berries will freeze in little pools of water and make it difficult to remove from pan.  Once the berries are frozen (after several hours or overnight), place frozen berries in freezer bag.  Freezing them first on a jelly roll pan keeps them as individual berries and not one solid blob of frozen berries.  That allows you to be able to use as many or as few as you need each time.

 

When freezing peaches, wash, remove pits, remove any bad spots and quarter.  As with the berries, place on jelly roll pans until frozen before placing in freezer bags.  It is also a good idea to label and date your freezer bags for anything you put in your freezer.

Since we use our frozen berries and peaches for making smoothies throughout the year, I do not remove the skins.  Once the peaches have been through my Blendtec blender, the skins are not even noticeable and the book that came with my blender says removing the skins is unnecessary.  Does anyone know if this is the case for all blenders?  I'm sure it would also be true for Vitamix blenders, but wondered about the average blender.  Not removing the skins is sure a huge time-saver. 

Using the frozen fruit for smoothies works wonderfully.  The flavor tastes fresh and no ice cubes need to be added to the smoothies.  I wonder if all blenders are capable of blending peaches straight from the freezer.  Anyone have experience or insight with that?  I would hate for someone to try this only to wind up with a broken blender.

Now on to peppers!  This year was a bumper pepper crop for us.  We had more than we needed for eating fresh and making salsa, so freezing was an easy way to preserve the excess.  I cut the bell peppers into strips after the seeds were removed so they would be ready for fajitas.  Again it is important to freeze them on a jelly roll pan before putting in a freezer bag so they freeze individually.  I can now pull out as many peppers as I need each time I make fajitas.  They obviously can be used for other things, but I know our family will probably eat them all in fajitas.

Our Banana Peppers were also prolific this year.  Banana Peppers or Hungarian Wax Peppers (whichever plants we happen to find for that year) are mild peppers that we love to cook with our zucchini and summer squash.  They can be substituted for recipes that call for a can of diced green chilies or any recipe that would benefit from peppers, such as enchiladas or soups. To prepare for freezing, just chop in a food processor.  I did not include the seeds because we like the more mild flavor.  Put the chopped peppers into ice cube trays and freeze.  The chopped pepper freezes together into little pepper cubes.  Pop the frozen pepper cubes out and put into a freezer bag.  For my peppers, each pepper cube equaled a little less than one pepper.

 

Zucchini (mostly in bread form) is another one I fill my freezer with.  I also can't forget the freezer jam since that is almost a daily staple with as many school lunches as we pack each week.  Freezers really are an easy way to enjoy your produce all year!

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Please share if you have other ideas for freezing your harvest or if you have answers to our burning blender questions!  What do you freeze?