Early Fall
A view from the top of Ski Santa Fe across stretches of changing Aspen and down into Santa Fe in the valley below.
Beyond cooling temperatures and vibrant orange-yellow leaves, signs of the changing season appear everywhere. Mornings are darker and days shorter. Folks are less likely to leave the house without a light jacket.
Our yard at Chula Vista no longer has so many purple flowers, in their place fluffy seed pods.
A few weeks back we attended the last Beekeepers meeting of the year, a honey tasting! At that meeting we were encouraged to test and treat for mites. As the bee populations drop, mite populations increase geometrically and the ratio becomes unsustainable. An organic treatment that purportedly addresses mites throughout the hive, even in the brood chambers, is possible only after daytime temperatures are reliably below 85 degrees and above 50 degrees. We are in that sweet spot and so we opened the hive and dropped two Formic Pro patches between the two brood boxes. I have no photos of this event. It took Robert and me all our concentration to keep the smoke going, separate the boxes, and unwrap and place the caustic treatment. While changing between my regular work gloves and acid proof gloves I was stung. Bees were everywhere and it was hard to sweep them to safety. Restacking the boxes we certainly crushed a few. It was not a smooth operation. I’ve spent the two weeks since worrying that we might have killed our hive, as sometimes happens. In the first days there were tons of bees outside working to ventilate the entrance and popping out of the enclosure to harvest the last of the nectar flow. More recently it has been quieter partly because it is cooler and wetter. Wednesday morning I checked and things seem okay, bees coming and going as they usually do.
busy bees entering and leaving a Langstroth hive.
Not only the bees are preparing for winter. On a rainy cool evening at the end of last week we enjoyed a cheery fire at our rental. To prepare for more we had a cord of wood delivered and stacked at Chula Vista. It’s much cheaper than buying by the bundle.
As I write, a cold front has blown in and overnight lows are in the 30s. Time to get cozy.
