I've had to sell my bees.  Hans Barr (not a near relative of my husband) just bought them. 

If you get an error message, just click it a few times, and it will open in YouTube.

My bees are really cold.  They're barely moving.  But THIS gives me hope.


I'll keep providing food and water and staying out of the hive.  I don't even know if the queen is alive.  Whether she is or not, I'm getting a new monarch from these guys this summer.


Start worrying about your little insects and I'll guarantee you, you'll stop being afraid of them.  All you can think of is how to keep the Girls alive.

Land of Eggs and Honey

     We have a problem; too many eggs.

     We can't eat more than one a day each, in whatever form -- they're just too rich -- and the girls are out-laying us.  We'll have to take the excess to the folks who give us salmon.  Poor us.

     The eggs are color coded; the two pale yellow-green (bottom left, top right) are from White.  The large pale brown (lower right) is Black's.  Red lays the dark red with white speckles (upper left).  Black's eggs are the richest -- but she's by far the fattest.  Lift her up and feel the rolls of blubber and all you'll think of is duck-style-roasted chicken.

      After feeding them for a year, was thinking of just buying grown layers next time, but now realizing the rich feeding while they're growing up is what's making them good layers, despite their youth and the season of winter.  We've discovered a source of great calcium; dried-out sea-urchin and crab shells from the beach.  It's where we get the good grit, too, with the addition of sea minerals.  Fat hen + loads of calcium = loads of fat eggs.  Well, d'uh.

     Speaking of feeding animals right to get a return: after years of thinking and research, finally bought a beehive from Sunny Farms.  It has two fully-framed brood bodies and a honey body.  All the amateur -- and I do mean "WTF are we doing?" amateur -- beekeepers up here are listening to me when I tell 'em NOT to feed the bees crappy sugar and corn-syrup to get them through the winter.  Hello?  Colony Collapse Syndrome?  The bees are having enough trouble without being given crummy ersatz food.  Or, to quote, "Thou shall not muzzle the ox that treads the corn," if you need something from that antique-science book. The local Olympic Grays ("Pioneer" bees from Caucasian stock brought in by white settlers over a century ago and gone feral) are pumping out honey and white wax -- from the Douglas Firs, would you believe! -- like little machines.   One keeper has over 100 pounds of honey on one hive. Imagine what fir honey tastes like.  If you like pine-nuts....  At least I'm imagining it; nobody's tasted it yet.  

     My hive is actually painted; I found some neutral base, so the hive can have that nice raw-wood look and still be protected.  I'm not going to buy bees; I'm going to ask one of the local keepers if I can put one of my hive bodies next to his until we get a swam to inhabit it.  Maybe offer him some eggs.

Unwatered Wine

The Greeks said not to drink unwatered wine, for it would lead to madness. I'm snorking down the Gallo Paisano with no care for Homeric safety regulations.

Mostly it's because we're still on death-watch for Hector. I have a million things to do, and can only circle uselessly around them. Or watch Hector to see if he will even eat a smidgen of food. Or to see if he wants me to put on his green leash and let him all rickety pull me around the yard.  The other night he did it in the dark, three times through the working wood-pile.  No doubt to lose me so he could go die under the house.  I'm sorry, but it's the only thing I'm not letting him do.  Mr. Weird is now Mr. Flat-ass Stubborn. Anyway, after two and a half months, all the grief of my life -- humans as well as animal, including a terrible loss and a missed opportunity recently -- is circling my head and turning me into a vegetable (this is drunk writing, so I'm not taking responsibility for any of it).


Ran into a very dear friend on the beach today, who said that their household fell apart as their old dog died.  So I don't feel so lost and stupid about it now.

She had smoked rabbit.  We swapped for our smoked salmon.  Then we spent the evening blathering and laughing. She's one of the few people up here on my intellectual level, and her daughter is a living spark.  I, of course, did not recognize the kid.  How am I supposed to recognize someone I could once pick up and carry and who can now look me in the eye?  Some kid is going to figure out that adults -- especially we old farts -- cannot recognize them before and after the growth spurt and scam us to dead.


Next step, if I can just get anything done:  build the basis for the bee-hives.  I love honey.  The 3 hens are laying what comes to an egg a day.  The seeds just came in the mail.  With honey, eggs and veggies and the occasional fish, we'll have more than enough to eat and swap.

I may have talked myself into milking the old farmer's cows for him.  As he said, his 80 + years hands can't do it any more, and he's had to let the cows dry up.  If I do, it's half the milk, and I don't care how that makes me sound.  CHEESE.  And yogurt.  Which I'll share with him, too.  Fuck, I'm becoming a farmer.


And another shot of the young whale on the beach the other day. Note how close to the shore. It shelves off very abruptly.