Speed Bump

I haven't posted for awhile. What's my excuse? A combination of things. I hesitate to write when all I have to write about is bad news.

Bad luck with the beehives in my yard is one frustration. Both hive were attacked by wax moths. I need to do a postmortem to be fair. Both colonies were weak. When they split earlier and when one didn't have a queen, I should have just recombined them. But, having not done that, they both limped along. At the least, I should have put an entrance reducer on to give them a fighting chance. But, in the end, they both died. Fortunately, the hive in Clarence's yard was strong. We harvested a gallon and a half of honey from it; enough for the family for the rest of the year, but not enough to give much away. (Clarence got a quart, of course.)

The failure of the tomatoes has been another issue. Lately, they have been doing much better. I think the weather has helped; enough rain and cooler temperatures. They are still ripening slowly. We have made some dried tomato but have not canned anything yet.

The zucchini and yellow squash were another disaster. The squash bugs just massacred the plants. We got 6 or 7 fruits and I think that will be it. Pretty disastrous!

The other part of the speed bump has been work (what I do for a living). I am grateful to be fully self-employed. We put out two new grant proposals last week and the prep time kept me exhausted into the evening hours. There were other tasks at work as well. We leased a new printer that requires some attention to learn how to use and to get our materials ready for production.

Finally, I spent a little time with the boy scouts and family sailing. Honestly, if you had to choose between sailing and writing about the disaster occurring in your garden, which would you pick?