Coffee 9-1-12

SteveZee wrote:...>8...PS: Almost forgot, this must be wasp season cause I too had some building a nest right inbetween the old storm windows of my bedroom window. Didn't see it right off due to a curtain obscuring that upper corner. After several runs out on the porch roof with the raid they seem to be gone but I need to be sure before I open that storm window and take it out! I can't get a direct shot at it either being between to sliding panes. Might have to get me a can of the freeze stuff.

Wasp and hornet season. Yellow Jackets for sure. Had a nest in the ground just to the right of the front door. I had the spray but didn't get to them right away as they really weren't bothering us at all. Wife whent outside in the morning two Saturdays agot and told me there was a hole in the ground where the hornets use to be. Seems they made a good meal for the neighborhood skunk. You could see where the low-bellied critter crossed the grass from the woods right to the flower bed where the nest hole was. Skunk came back two days later and finished everything that was left, and it wasn't much that it left behind the first time

Coupla holes appeared in my yard the past few days, the skunks are looking for snacks again.

A touch late on the coffee this weekend I am. Well finally sold our stratus. Sad to see it go, put about 75,000 mile on er with only haven to change rear struts once and a little preventive maintaince. Whew me and the Mrs got ourselves into the tequila last night and still feeling the effects of that, coffee sure is helping. Wow did it get brisk past couple of nights. I think I seen freddy post frost isnt too far away, and thats for sure. I'm ready to oil the mower deck and pack 'er away for the season. All have a great weekend, its off to ocean city md this week for this guy!

VigIIPeaBurner wrote:

SteveZee wrote:...>8...PS: Almost forgot, this must be wasp season cause I too had some building a nest right inbetween the old storm windows of my bedroom window. Didn't see it right off due to a curtain obscuring that upper corner. After several runs out on the porch roof with the raid they seem to be gone but I need to be sure before I open that storm window and take it out! I can't get a direct shot at it either being between to sliding panes. Might have to get me a can of the freeze stuff.

Wasp and hornet season. Yellow Jackets for sure. Had a nest in the ground just to the right of the front door. I had the spray but didn't get to them right away as they really weren't bothering us at all. Wife whent outside in the morning two Saturdays agot and told me there was a hole in the ground where the hornets use to be. Seems they made a good meal for the neighborhood skunk. You could see where the low-bellied critter crossed the grass from the woods right to the flower bed where the nest hole was. Skunk came back two days later and finished everything that was left, and it wasn't much that it left behind the first time

Amazing story VigII. I too have seen a couple holes around the yard lately. Never knew they would take on a nest of yellowjackets though, Wow!

I had an "experiance" with yellow jackets as a kid. My cousin and I sneaking up on my Brother and other cousin through some brambles/blackberry bushes. Start to feel stings, Look around thinking its the prickers and nope it's yellers . We tore a** through those blackberry like the roadrunner cartoon. I was leaning so far forward in my flight that my feet couldn't keep up . Kept falling forward. Finally get back to the picnic area (in front of about 10 people) howling to my Mum, and to put the icing on the cake, Mum rips my shorts down to get a yellow jacket out of me pants Guess there was concern about getting stung in the family jewels . Anyways, ever since that day, I've had a fear of UFO's.

Hi everyone,

So it's Labor Day and the end of the summer. I picked up my school bus, routes and checked out the parking location. This year should be a breeze especially since I've got enough seniority now that I earned an Air Conditioned bus. This will be the first year I won't be able to tell my High School students that the bus is older than they are.

DK and I were able to take one thing off our bucket list yesterday. The company our daughter works for sponsors a "minor" league NASCAR car and she was able to get tickets to the races for last night at the Old Dominion Raceway in Manassas. It was interesting but has a language all to itself so I can't tell you what was racing in any particular race. There were things called "mid modified" and "U" cars. I'll told that stands for "U can't afford it." They sure looked and sounded fast. The main race was 100 laps with the "modified" stock cars. Because the race track is so small they don't count miles but rather laps. The main event started with 17 cars but by the time it ended there were 11. The Number 2 corner was particularly bad for car's longevity. It was a great evening of family fun. We are going to try to get tickets to a Richmond NASCAR race; maybe make a weekend out of it.

My bees are doing well, they have stored 60 lbs of honey for their use this winter as well of building (drawing out) 3 full boxes of empty honey comb for my use in the spring. Those boxes mean the "girls" won't have to waste time building honey comb in the spring but can go right to making honey for me. I hope I've learned enough and planned well enough that the colony will survive the winter. If I did, I should get a whole lot of honey for my use this time next year. I'll just have to wait and see.

As someone else said, I’m starting to look at my stove as something other than a plant stand. I’ll be checking out what coal I have left over from last year and getting the balance for the upcoming winter soon but if this year is typical, I won’t be lighting the stove until Thanksgiving.

We don't have big plans for tomorrow, good thing as we are expecting the remains of Isaac over the next 4 days. I hope everyone has a great holiday. Take care, Lisa

lowfog01 wrote:they have stored 60 lbs of honey for their use this winter

W-wow! That's a lot of honey! Is that their food for the winter? I mean.... if you took that honey would they starve to death? Is so.... I'm sure glad you went to "bee school"! Even though they are small and different than all others, I guess that they need to be seen as any animal that we ask to do work for us... they need to be cared for in a knowledgeable way if we expect them to do the work we want done.

I'm sure glad I filled the coal bin yesterday. I looked at the weather forecast yesterday morning. It showed sunny and zero percent chance of rain for yesterday and mostly sunny, cooler, and 10% chance of rain today. I thought "It might be cooler on Sunday, but I just want to get it done". I'm some glad I decided to do it yesterday because it's raining now & NOW they are saying rain all day! Sheeesh!

SteveZee wrote:Amazing story VigII. I too have seen a couple holes around the yard lately. Never knew they would take on a nest of yellowjackets though, Wow!

Quite a good yarn you got there too, SteveZee Those are the events we tend to remeber, like being twice stung, not only by the bees but the whole depanting thing too

I learned about skunks and bees when I kept hives. Lisa, stay on the lookout for scratches on the hive body just above the entrance on either side of the bottom board. The striped stinkers love to eat honey bees. They come in to the apiary at night when the girls don't like to fly, scratch at the box and wait. When a pile of honey bees come out to see who's knocking, the skunk scoffs them up and sucks the juices out of them. If you miss the tell-tale scratches, just look for stuff that looks like a used wad of chewing tobacco (know what that looks like?) They spit them out when they're sucked dry and go for another mouth full Tough 'sucker' that they are

Engoy the holiday everyone!

Looking around for something to do this weekend and found this.

http://joelandersonphoto.com/coalmine

tsb wrote:Looking around for something to do this weekend and found this.

http://joelandersonphoto.com/coalmine

Those boys work hard for their money. Thanks for sharing.

Nice post tsb, thanx

Some honey-related trivia for you: Honey is the only food that never spoils.

Been a banner year up here for yellow jackets & white-faced hornets - those bastards are relentless & mean! They WILL catch you sooner or later after you disturb their nest. Had a nice big paper nest of them forming in the soffit just under the peak of the roof. Then in the exact same spot in the back was a giant yellow jacket nest. My spray couldn't reach that high, so I had to go through the second-floor window and try to aim and hit them both, without getting stung in the face, or getting a face full of poison. A few almost flew in the window, but the spray took care of them pretty quick. Then there were 7 more nests out and about around the property, above AND below ground. Never seen so many! Even had several mud wasp nests in the shed.

Been super busy here. Haven't made much progress on the Focus. Did manage to install the piston assembly & torque down the big-end cap. That's about it. Got to get my ass in gear on that thing, or I'll be taking out loans to pay credit cards off ...

Well, looks like I'll be running the Mark III one more year. Got too much nut here .. and besides ... the new boiler is sitting in my kitchen strapped to a 2-wheeler. Not going to be of much use up there! Don't have the dough to buy the necessary plumbing either so it's just as well. Spent my last dollar on supplies for the barn roof. That is the priority now ... or else I lose everything I worked for to water damage. Should be starting that project very soon. Hopefully I can get the Focus running before then ... or else that's going to get put off even longer. Also got to do an oil pan & timing cover gasket in the Blazer sometime before the snow flies ... and the upper ball joints. MOOGS too! Didn't even get one year out of them. It never ends over here!

Freddy wrote:W-wow! That's a lot of honey! Is that their food for the winter? I mean.... if you took that honey would they starve to death? !

Yep, that's their food for the winter. If you harvest too much honey, the bees die. The thing is they are pretty dependent on human interaction to survive now days. Even with all that honey in storage, they may starve to death anyway because they have to stay in a cantaloupe size cluster all winter to maintain their heat. They will only move an inch or two in any direction to find food. I'll have to check on their status throughout the winter and move frames of the stored honey within their reach to help them over the winter. If they eat all the stored honey I'll have to provide a food supplement untill the honey flow starts in the spring.

Freddy wrote:Is so.... I'm sure glad you went to "bee school"! Even though they are small and different than all others, I guess that they need to be seen as any animal that we ask to do work for us... they need to be cared for in a knowledgeable way if we expect them to do the work we want done.

You are spot on! Bee's account for 2/3s of all food grown in the United States and they are in danger from pesticides, colony killing mites and illnesses. In fact, it's very rare that you'd come across a feral bee colony now and swarms from a domestic hive usually die in 6 months or less without human intervention. The country needs more backyard beekeepers to sustain the food supplies. That's what they call people like me with one or two colonies in the backyard. We'll never make a living at keeping bees but we will help insure the nation's food supply. I'm glad I went to Bee School, too. I didn't realize how precarious the situation is before I got involved with bees. Once they are established keeping bee hives in the backyard takes little time but makes a big contribution to community. I like those kinds of service opportunities. Take care, Lisa

coffee was good, but brief. Full day..in am ran to empire tractor in cortland picked up parts for hay mower, and ordered a few more. Talked to sales man about small square balers(used for purchase), has one price is a bit high NH316 with pan kicker holding off for now.ET told me about a little mom-pops dinner in cortland for breaffast, we stopped food was excellent and nice prices.

Then it was off to coventry (wrench wranch) blue grass festival for remaider of day. There was one act there, Smokey Greene http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_rUtC4yrUM , He just started preforming again after battle with cancer. He's lot a lot of weight and looks fraail, but man that guy can sing and play the guitar to no end for an 83 year old gent. Hats off to him, even bought a few of his Cds.

sunday was work on equipment day, home chores, etc. Monday is get tractor from farm bring it home and test run mower after 2 years rebuilding it. keeping fingers crossed main drive & roller drive gear boxes are good. if so then finish assembling reel and take it to farm to store till needed next spring. Then put new gear box on brush hog coming weekend to mow down buckwheat, then lightly disc fields to reseed the buckwheat back in for next spring.
still have 2 hives up at farm, beekeeper said they weren't full when checked other week, but said he will be coming up this coming weekend to check them. I'm getting anxious to get some of that buckwheat honey.

Nice post on the Bee's Lisa. Of course around here we have allot of bee keepers because of the blueberrys. Each and every blueberry produced must be touched (pollinated) by a bee. There are usually big loads of fenced off hives strategically placed around the barrens. During the height of it so can actually see long undulating strings of flying bee's back and forth to the hives. It looks like a moving road map! Amazing creatures those Bee's.

Sorry we just have a bunch of Great White Sharks...
Beaches got closed for the long weekend...
One of the sharks was just 15 ft off of Nauset Beach...
It only hurts if the shark thinks you are a Seal...