Bees on Marble and the Cow’s Dining Car
Bees are great ones for sleeping in. Only the scouts were out and about in this early morning shot. But once the worker bees get the message this will be a busy plate later in the day. As the demand grows I will put out greater quantities of sugar water.
Daisy, Queenie and this years Bobby LOVE their new dining car. The Bobby’s face is wet because I wash their faces in the morning to keep the flies off their eyes. The joys of having only a few cows.
I promised I would show you the bee’s water bowl . It is under a barely dripping tap and is full of bricks. So the bees get to lap up the water (which they carry back to the hive in little bags attached to their legs) without falling into the bowl. Please ignore any leaf that looks autumnal – it is a figment of your imagination!
Pigeon Pie anyone!?
This little sequence needs no introduction. I know I am raising these piglets for meat for the families but it will be happy meat! I see no reason why animals raised for the table cannot have a good life too!
Good morning!
Last night it rained and rained all through the night. In fact we got one and a half inches of rain. It is just lovely. I was out in my nightie and gumboots making sure the broiler chicks were dry, it was so warm. I did not want to come back in. Just delicious. I had to close all the French doors on my way back to bed but they have all stood open night and day for weeks now and there were boots and mats and pots of plants to move. Funny how we settle into a long stretch of hot summer weather wishing for rain then are caught unprepared when it actually does rain.
Everything will grow today. It is still warm. The forecast says low 80’s today so it will be perfect weeding and harvesting weather.
I hope you all have a lovely day.
Love your friend on the farm, celi
52 Comments on “Bees on Marble and the Cow’s Dining Car”
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thekitchensgarden 
those sure are happy pigs. and ton does such a good job. i am hoping your rain is coming this way today. we sure need it!
John always says it will rain in october, I hope you don’t have to wait that long.. everything has perked up in the gardens and fields, I am always thrilled to see the clover standing up straight,.. c
We should only eat Happy Pork! Love those faces! Hoping the rain comes this way as the well went dry yesterday that supplies the old farmhouse. The water table here is extremely low. It recovered enough to run the pump this morning but we are on limited use until we get rain.
yikes.. limited toilet flushings! i hate that.. hope you get some rain soon, your situation is approaching dire.. c
The situation was better today. Someone let the barn water run too long (it wasn’t me, honest!!) Lessson learned. This morning my husband found that the well level had come up, and he got the pump primed and there is water! Still being careful. Still waiting for rain…
With my brain not quite in gear lately i have let the troughs run over a few times, it makes a terrible mess, not to mention the waste of water.. so I do understand .. um.. whoever had that wee problem.. c
Hope you got all the rain you needed Maggie as it will be beautifully dry for another week HUGS Eunice
Love your feeder – re-purposing at its finest!
Of course our meat animals should lead happy lives – it’s how we should honor their gift to us. The Native American tribes near where I grew up gave thanks to the spirit of the animals they hunted for food – not a bad idea.
Enjoy your weather – we’re back in the Hot and Humid’s….
It is a deeply right feeling when you say thank you to an animal when he is on his way. We have a god week of very cool temps ahead of us, I hope that is not the last of the heat though, you know I am a summer girl.. c
Celi, those are the happiest piglets I have ever seen, and I love that you are so kind to your dinner on the hoof. I wish everyone were as kind. Do you eat pigeon? We used to when I was a child and remember is was boney, but tasted good. Mom roasted them like petite chickens. 😉
Enjoy your easy weeding today!
No I have never eaten pigeon, but as Mad Dog says my pigeons should taste good as they only eat the very best of the chicken feed! c
Don’t you wish you could lie about all day in the sun like those piggies?
When I was not much younger I used to do my housework then sit in the sun with a book.. I think i need to set aside a piggie sun day and do just that! c
I’m with you on that one. Let’s declare a Lying About With A Book Day very soon. I used to do that too. Maybe some snowed-in day in a few months…
I don’t think I’ve ever seen such happy pigs!
That feeder looks great – Mary would approve 😉
This breed of pigs has a smile on their faces naturally, i know they are not smiling, that is fanciful, but because they look smiley I cannot help but smile with them.. have a lovely afternoon Mad! c
I’m sure they’d all smile living with you 😉
Your pigs do look happy. We were always told growing up that we raised animals to eat but always treated them with respect. what a great sacrifice so we can be nourished. We always thanked our animals and now my 3 yr-old grandaughter thanks the chickens every time she gathers eggs for me. Very sweet. I remember reading an earlier post you are planting willows and that this is good for a pigs system. Is this any kind of willow tree?
Brenda
I plant the willows for the ruminants, the cows and sheep mostly. They are a good source of supplementary feed plus are known to help in maintaining a healthy digestive tract. Willows are an old remedy for worms. Though the worms we are dealing with now would probably laugh at a willow leaf. The ones they plant in NZ are Matsudana. Just the regular old weeping willow, I just take cuttings from any willows I see and grow them. In fact this year I am growing the yellow bark twisted willow because I planted two this year and had to prune them. How lovely that your granddaughter thanks the chickens, kids love to gather eggs. Every child that comes here wants to gather eggs and then take the home!! c
Did you know willow bark contains salicylic acid,, aka aspirin? A Native American remedy for pain.
Yes i did, in fact it is an old roman pain relief also.. clever bunch.. c
Oh happy happy pigs! I loved seeing that photo of FB yesterday Celi and it lightened up the day for me massively. 🙂
They are light aren’t such gloriously naughty little chaps.
Boy but the porkers do look like they are enjoying themselves…
Little porkers.. (chuckle).. c
I love the smiles on those piggy faces!! Just like dogs and cats and cows and horses you can see their smiles….Terry says I am just dreaming…but I can and so I do! I also can see naughty faces and just about to knock you down faces, so if I can see those, why not SMILES!!
Smiling back at ya, Cecilia!
Linda
http://coloradofarmlife.wordpress.com
http://deltacountyhistoricalsociety.wordpress.com
Very true, contentment can almost be felt emenating from some animals! c
Who’d have thought that a couple of pigs would make me laugh today. Thanks for that! M xx
Oh my goodness, I haven’t seen Daisy in such a long time. I just kept smiling looking at her. I really enjoyed this post 🙂
You will have seen Daisy’s mouth, that is Queenie in the middle of the frame, she will have grown since you aw her last! I shall get a good shot of Daisy for you soon… Lovely to see you! c
The piggies are so big!!!
The pigs are getting so big! They looked very content. 🙂
Marvelous rain. We need some, too, up here in parched Minnesota.
Oh my goodness, those piggies are adorable. And you’re absolutely right, happy animals make happy meat! I had fresh chicken in Hungary when I was 18 and remember how much different it tasted than the store bought kind we have here; they must have been happy too, running around in the yard for duration of their lives.
Mine are very happy in their ark, and at the risk of sounding blood-thirsty (or as i said the other day like the witch in hansel and gretel) i am very much looking forward to tasting them! Oh you know what, i should call the ark the Ginger Bread House! Hilarious. OK time for me to get out there and pick more tomatoes, i am laughing at my own jokes! c
I think you should take that dining car on the road – sort of like my old ice cream truck. Ton certainly keeps an eye on things – is he afraid the pigs are going to wake up? Doesn’t appear to me that they’re in a hurry to go anywhere.
Nice dining car! You’ve put it to good use. Those pigs sure do look comfortable and happy!
You could title that series of piggy pics “Contentment”. They look so very comfortable. Love the bee shots. That rain passed us by. I was up late again last night, expecting to hear it fall, but it never came. It will soon enough, I’m sure. Have a good night, Celi!
We were so lucky to get such a downfall, I barely slept just listening to the joy of it! You have a good night too.. sleep.. c
Hey, a roll in the mud keeps the piggies cool!
all cool pigs roll in the mud! c
My first click for the day! What a happy one! Well, if the worker bees do sleep in, can we really say ‘busy as a bee’? Hmm! The cow feeder: such imagination . . . but I have never ever heard cow’s faces being washed like babies’ ones 😀 ! I wonder how many farmers do that ? 🙂 ! And just love Ton Ton working so hard making sure those happy piggies go so far but no further!! Good for the rain: will there be another cut? [city gal asking again!!].
The fourth cut will be after the killing frost, it will be standing hay by then so we will gather it in. I will need it too. Though I may or may not take that cut, we will see if there is enough rain.. c
Great post! I didn’t see any leaves in the bees water bowl. lol
Nothing better than a good mud spa – ha! The bees are pretty active here too – getting ready to hibernate I guess. Happy Almost Weekend on the Farmy:)
Wonderful photos! I especially like the one of the bee’s water bowl.
I love the pigs sequence. They are growing so fast! I’m enjoying the bees bowl of marbles and sugar water, but especially the way you take the hard learnings from one year and plough them back into the ground, so to speak, turning them to a good purpose the following year. I hope the hive survives splendidly through the winter this time.
I thought the bees carried water in their honey stomachs like nectar and it was just the pollen that goes in their pollen baskets? Love the piggies!
oh those piglets are just soo cute!
I loved the reference to figment of my mind lol lot of that going on up here in the Northeast ENJOY your long SUMMER 🙂
Wonderful photographs, they seem so lovely 🙂 Dear Celi, can I ask you something about bee plate? As I can see you filled with glass balls, and you fill water with sugar… Why all of them? Yes, this sugar water seems that would be a nice and good food for them. My main question is to have a plate like that does it keep them away from your breakfast table… for example for me, maybe you don’t know, we had a village home near to the city and I was there all summer days… But bees didn’t let us to sit outside in safe… I used many things, I burned coffee (for its smoke) and lavender or mint on the table and finally vinegar with onion in water… So many times we had our breakfast indoors… Yes, bees problem for us, when I read you know, I wanted to ask dear Celi, Thank you, love, nia
well it certainly does draw the bees over to that tree, (so make sure you put the sugar water far away from where you are eating) they only bother us outside when they re hungry so it stands to reason that feeding them somewhere else would at least lessen the numbers that bother your meal, what an interesting problem, many places are sad that there are not bees and you have too many! Good in a way.. c