On the land

Wildlife activities

WAS 03/14/19 - Beavers have been way upstream from their normal digs

WAS 03/14/19 - (large doe)

WAS 02/26/18 - Treetop raccoon

Owl or hawk got this rabbit 1/30/19

Big Brown Bat - 09/14/18

WAS 08/05/18 Bumble bee (Bombus Impatiens) on Bergamont.

WAS - 12/18/17 - Large burrow just emerged ... owner not yet identified.

(07/25/17) Timber Rattlesnake in action. The TR is rare now and protected in a number of Iowa counties. Populations of the snake have continued to drop-off significantly but people still feel the appropriate response is to kill them on sight. Settlers in 1848 held a snake hunt to see which part of the county could kill the most rattlesnakes. Over 3000 snakes were killed then. W.S. Wilkinson wrote the story of the hunt (presented to the Madison County Historical Society and published in the History of Madison County 1915).

07/10/17 - Green Heron at the main pond. It has been here on a regular basis mid-summer the last couple of years.

Woodland snail. and Ailanthus webworm moth. The webworm is a moth who likes both milkweed and tree of heaven. We have both. We are chipping away at removing the invasive tree of heaven but it is a tall order. A grove of tree of heaven was at WAS going back prior owners over 40 years ago.

07/05/17 - Habitat log in pond (left) and American bullfrog on the pond's edge (right.)

06/26/17 - Moving out from along the creek near under the large Burr Oak (southern field)

06/24/17 Clearwing hummingbird moth (left) resting on partridge pea and dragonfly (unidentified) on the lower CRP field. The field was burned this spring and has responded well.

Just a snippet of the chorus from the main pond (5/17)

Along the Middle River bank (3/16)

Along Middle River 3/16

Mushroom cultivation

WAS 03/21/19 - Oyster logs (Grey Dove, Pohu, and Kira)

.WAS 02/19 - Thinning the forest of ironwood (hop hornbeam, a native in our understory) and cutting logs for mushroom cultivation. Drilling holes for plug spawn with Double Jewell (WR) strain of Shiitake mushrooms. There is always a pinch of pain to cut down a tree that has been growing as long or longer than I have been living. This tree was provided prime logs for mushroom so the reward will be forthcoming. A specialty drill bit may seem to be luxury but this Japanese bit has made drilling and hammer the plugs much more elegant and easy.

the logs in their nature blankets 01/19

WAS 09/01/18 - Shiitake (WR Bellweather strain) fruiting on the logs. Fairly robust fruiting after about 18 months since inoculation. Starting dehydration process to preserve the output.

WAS 05/27/18 - Wine cap fruiting (finally). We used straw for the growing medium. The patch is located by one of our favorite Burr oaks.

WAS - Shittake from the logs

WAS 05/15/18 - Mushroom logs

WAS 05/06/18 - Literally, the first mushroom grown from our logs. It was a year long wait and not sure if anything was going to fruit. Hopefully, many more to come but at least something grew. Very tasty too.

Rebecca Beachy inoculating logs .... one heading to Chicago.

11-17 Momo inoculating ironwood log with Shiitake pegs

(3/28/17) Loading white oak logs to take in from inoculating with spores. A large white Oak (single trunk from multi-trunk tree) went down across the trail so clean up provides a bonus opportunity for more mushrooms.

1000 Shiitake pegs in the bag and melted cheese wax on the hot plate.

35 inoculated logs (1000 pegs done) ready to go under their blanket for now.

5/10/17 - Wine Cap (native to Iowa) spores ready to spread. Stock tank patched up and used for straw fermentation vat that will be substrate for wine caps. Two bales of wheat straw have been under water for several days.

Hives

It not often known that honey bees are not native to North America. They are believed to have been brought to Virginia in 1621. However, much of our food supply now depends on them for pollination services. Since they have been in the US for 400 years they are typically considered a naturalized species. The honey bees are usually raised in Langstroth hives with removable frames.

Our bees are Italians (Apis mellifera ligustica) which are the most common sub species of the western honey bee used in the US. The cliche "busy as a bee" is true. Honey bees are "overproducers" of honey and must keep active or suffer stress. Our bees have been busy on the prairie this past year and we plan to continue to expand our bee keeping endeavor.

3/10/18 - We ordered new Saskatraz queens. We hope to split the hives this year to create the new colonies with the Saskatraz at the helm. This is merely testing something new and different for us, but the Saskatraz characteristics look exciting.

WAS - Hive check shows robust activity with large brood. Temperatures up in the 50s the past week have brought bees outside. Capped honey still in store on all of the super frames. We decided no need to provide additional feed.

Aerial view of hives at WAS

01/03/18 - The hives viewed from the prairie to the north. When we put the bee cozy's on (black insulation wraps) end of November it seemed a bit much but after numerous subzero days seems like a pretty good move.

11/19/17 - Eastern hive

11/19/17 - Winterizing the nives... adding insulation, vapor barrier and checking on overall hive condition.

11/07/17 - "Vaping" with oxalic acid to treat mites. It is interesting this kills mites and not bees. The battery heats a wand ($$) that vaporizes the powered acid.

WAS 10/06/17 - Pure Raw Prairie Honey

WAS - 10/01/17 The hives (a bit jangling) just before the bee reduction and honey supers (upper boxes) collection. Fume board was used to great effect to remove the bees from boxes on the western hive and to poor effect on the eastern hive. The stowaway bees went up the road to the house. A blower was used but still not good result. It took a little research but then they were eventually removed and then given safe passage back to the hive. Honey processing scheduled for Tuesday.

WAS - 9/28./17 Bees in west hive have nearly full frames of honey and so added the one more super. The east hive is a bit less productive but coming along.

Entrance buzzing 08/08/17

07/09/17 - Our bees have been working on the milkweed.

Our new bees have settled in to their hives. Queens are active and lots of good comb production in both hives. We added supers on 6/5/17. The Italian bees have been very well mannered and there bright yellow coloration is aesthetically pleasing.

(05/16/17) Bees dropped into their boxes. We did have a stubborn subgroup who decided to make a home out of the boxes and had to be removed along with a lot of comb a couple weeks later.

Andrea bringing out a queen excluder for the hive. We set the hives up to the southeast to the barn in a lower meadow for a weather block from the north, access to the creek (150' to the south) and surrounding fields. We also have planted a new herb garden to partner with the bees.

Lighting up the smoker. Ready to calm the bees to transfer from their Nuc boxes to their new hives.

Katie (Andrea's sister) getting ready to divide the hive. The black Russians will have a new yellow Italian queen over at Andrea and Eric's. While there are some good efforts at mentoring beekeeping we still have a lot of opportunity to expand. This is encouraging development for those wanting to learn bee keeping in Iowa.

Our new hives from Spring Valley Honey Farm on display. We will site them and bees should be ready shortly to move in.

In the Fields

Honey Locust 02/02/19

WAS 11/25/18 - Old well in the lower prairie.

11/25/18 - Solitude II (nest)

WAS - 10/06/18 - A New England Aster out on its own in the upper prairie

WAS 10/06/18 - Upper prairie. Based on the original survey maps for European settlement this seems very similar to how it might have been at the time. The path would have been much narrower but still feels like just a foot or animal path.

WAS upper prairie - 09/14/18 Golden rod (two kinds)

WAS - upper prairie 09/14/18

WAS 07/20/18 Prairie Blazing Star on the upper CRP.

WAS 07/17/18 Grey Coneflower in the lower CRP at sunset.

WAS 03/15/18 - Middle river sunrise to the west of the lower field. The river is quite low and has been since late summer last year. This often changes with spring rainfall and can lead to flooding of the lower field. The island of snags (far right) formed a few years ago after flooding. The peninsula on the far left is a beaver haven with many small willows.