Last year my wife decided that she wanted to plant an herb garden in old tires. As fate would have it, her brother-in-law had some old tires sitting around so we gathered them up and went to work. One thing I've learned about growing herbs in Florida... full sun doesn't necessarily mean full sun. Needless to say, the herb garden didn't exactly work out for us. This year we decided to abandon the tire project and try something different with the herbs, but now I had old tires to contend with. I've been trying to work out a way to better protect my chickens. One side of the pen has some places where a predator might be able to dig in. So, I decided to put the tires on that side of the pen and plant some squash and zucchini in them. Here is the finished product. The cages are old storage bins that I use around my plants to keep the chickens from scratching out all the dirt... and from picking the plants apart.
A classic case of improvising, mate. Chapeau. BTW--I like the look of your chooks. What kind are they? Tell me about the sort of soil that you have planted your courgettes in. I am also interested in what sorts of courgettes you guys chose to grow.
Sjoerd, There are three yellow crookneck and one zucchini that was given to me by a friend, so I'm not sure exactly what kind. I used a mixture if potting soil and compost from the pile that I started last year. In the pen I have three Barred Rocks, one Buff Orpington and one Gold Wyandotte. Been wanting to share with you that I'm pretty sure I successfully split my first bee hive this year.
Thanks for the info about chooks and courgettes. I do not know a lot about chooks, but one sees some nice-looking ones on here from time to time. I hope that the courgettes do well for you. Don't forget to post more pics as they progress. Congrats on your hive split. How did you solve the queenless hive situation---did you buy a new queen or let them make one on their own? I guess you have not looked in yet to identify the new queen eh? Well, if the incoming bees have pollen on their pouches, then you can be reasonably sure that there is a queen and she is laying.....if you have had good enough weather and drones present to fertilize her that is. When did you split the hive anyway? We here are nearing the time when we can combine hives, splitting will come later, as our pops have not yet begun to increase substantially enough yet.
Love the dual purpose of the tyres Eclectic. I hope your crops grow well for you and those pesky predators stay away from your chooks.
Sjoerd, I split the hive last weekend so I realize that I am being fairly optimistic to suggest that it was successful. The optimism is coming from the fact that when I was checking the hive I found an unhatched queen cell. I used that frame in the split and left the old queen where she was. Both hives have been fairly active and I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
Another question: When you removed that one queen cell, have you since then checked to see if there were more queen cells in your original hive? If there are/were and your old queen is still present in the hive...they will swarm. Be careful.
So then, only one queen cell ! I am quite surprised. It makes me wonder if your other queen is still alive. Had you physically seen her? Just out of curiosity...tell me how you split your colony. We have here different names for the different types of hive splitting that one can do. I would ask you for that, but I am afraid that your name for the process I would not understand...that's why I asked you to describe the process. I am interested in how you guys beekeep over there.
Sjoerd, My method comes come a local beekeeper who has been working bees for 60 years. Basically, you take a frame of eggs, two frames of emerging brood and two frames of pollen/ honey and put them in a 5 frame nuc, making sure there are plenty of nurse bees. Close it up and check on them in a few weeks. Normally, they are expected to make a queen, but since I had the queen cell that should help speed up that process.
I see which way you did it now. You said that after putting everything in the new hive, you closed it up and then will check it in a few weeks. Did you mean that you close the entrance so that the bees could not fly in and out? Also, will you listen every evening to see if you can hear the new queen piping? BTW--is your mentor helping you with this process this time?
Sjoerd, Of couse I didn't block the entrance. I haven't been enlightened about listening for piping, but I am closely following all the steps that my mentor has passed along to me.
Oké mate...I am excited for you. Let us know how it turns out. Hive splitting is one of the especially interesting things that happens in beekeeping, I find.
