Since we left New York, Kevin and I have undertaken more new projects than two fifty-year-olds have any business attempting. And it is with surprise and gratification that we have seen most of them go well. We’ve raised chickens, turkeys, and ducks. We’ve designed and built coops, pens, and a hoophouse. We’ve grown a whole [...]
We’re about a month into our effort to get a weak bee hive, taken from the soffit of a house in Cotuit, strong enough to survive the coming winter. Our friends Claire and Paul have helped us take the heroic measures required: adding two frames of brood and nurse bees, and replacing the lackluster queen. [...]
Killing a queen bee is a strange experience. The queen is the hive. Her eggs populate it. Her pheromones suffuse it. Worker bees attend to her every want, and beekeepers watch to make sure she’s healthy and prolific. When you spot her, and take her between thumb and forefinger, you’ve got the hive’s future in [...]
I’ve been a licensed driver for thirty-two years now. In that time, I have owned seven vehicles with a total of fourteen bumpers. I have never put a bumper sticker on any of them. What is it about bumper stickers? There have been political candidates I’ve supported enthusiastically, there have been causes I’ve believed to [...]
If you’re thinking about getting bees, I have one recommendation: move to Cape Cod. It’s not because bees thrive here, or because we’re in particular need of pollination. It’s because you can learn about beekeeping from the Barnstable County Beekeepers Association, a group of insanely committed volunteers who are very generous with their time and [...]
You heard it here first. The Langstroth hive is in desperate need of a makeover. It’s important to note, as I rant about the inadequacies of the most popular beehive in the world, that Kevin and I are only one-season beekeepers, and we haven’t harvested one drop of our own honey. When we open our [...]
It was a weird day, today was. It started just after midnight, when Kevin and I were woken up by the sound of something either falling on or falling off our house. The latter, it turned out to be. The wind, which hadn’t been more than breezy when we went to bed, had started to [...]
When we lived in New York, drought was an abstract concept. I understood that, for people across large swaths of the world, it meant a serious threat to lives and livelihoods, but for us it meant that the weather was nice and that we didn’t flush the toilet. Now, though, I’m getting just the faintest [...]
I have no objection to slave labor of the animal variety. Our chickens wouldn’t exist unless we humans had long ago endeavored to domesticate them for their eggs and their meat, and I think we’ve struck a deal with them. Our end of the bargain is to give them a good life and a humane [...]
When my parents bought their place in Florida, almost twenty years ago, there was a truly horrible vanity in one of the bathrooms. It had gold-flecked formica on the countertop and gilt around the edge of the mirror. My mother, who likes to live a gilt-free, fleckless existence, wanted to burn it. “We can have [...]
Tamar Haspel has been writing about food and health for over a decade. She recently moved from Manhattan to Cape Cod. She’s adjusting well. [Read More …]
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