Using a rented 2-ton dump truck, we moved about 10 tons of excavated clay soil from the nearby lot where our house will be built to the lot we're borrowing to use as a vegetable garden. It's pretty lifeless stuff, but I've got some manure,
nuka (rice bran), chopped rice straw, etc to mix into it. I did more or less the same thing last year on a smaller scale and got great results for corn and peanuts. The tomatoes suffered from drought (we were on vacation) and soy beans from pests (I'm no match for
kamemushi aka stink bugs). I should probably mention that the reason more soil was necessary was the lot is mixture of concrete and sandy gravel. A hopeless combination.
As mentioned previously, I needed to make a follower board to prevent burr comb.
This is it.
The offending comb (far-right) is presently positioned facing inwards towards what is likely capped brood. Honestly , I was a little too preoccupied to check, though I can certify that there is capped brood on the frame on the far-left.
I recently read that it's pointless to try to change a bee's nature, they will do what they do. That being said, they can be guided. That's what all the frames and supers are for. For the second time, I scraped the comb off the outer lid, but this time I added a couple
sumaki . We'll see how that works out.
This smoker is most probably a piece of junk. I would be surprised if it lasts the year.
Here's the... *ahem* frame.
I decided not to lay the
sumaki directly on the top bars, instead I used a couple pieces of wood as spacers.
The current incarnation sans lid (I put it on after).
2 comments:
That's shrooms galore ! Nice. Any bee stings yet? That lifeless soil mulched and covered over one Japanese summer should turn into rich fertility. Good choice on hauling it in.
Is the plan to haul it back to the house lot once the house is built ? For raised beds around the place ?
ken
No bee stings yet. It's probably due to orange rainsuit I wear. Not a possibility in the summer, huh?
The garden where the soil was hauled is a place I'm borrowing that doesn't actually have soil. It's more of a gravel and concrete mix, so I've collected as much soil as possible regarding of quality to use there. It would have been easier to borrow an actual unused plot somewhere, but the place I've got is so close to our apartment. Such is life.
I'm afraid the new house won't have enough land to do much of anything with. I was thinking of growing some vines, maybe grapes.
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