Spring has Sprung... and Our Personal Hibernation is Almost Over

Spring has sprung in the Brazos Valley.  We have had a fairly eventful Winter, in which temperatures were yet again above the monthly 20^th century averages (as they have been every month since the late 1970s), and yet… enough freezing events happened that we were worried for a good long while about our pomegranates, figs, and peaches.

We are pleased to report that all the fruit trees save perhaps one of our six peach trees made it through unscathed.  We lost a eucalyptus, but then, we never really thought of it as a permanent fixture anyway – it was always just a matter of time before it froze back.

Meanwhile… our overwintered crops are doing well.  Fava beans should be ready to harvest in a month or so, onions are blooming, and our garlic is as big as I ever remember it getting before.

And the inevitable signs of Spring are here, too.  Sometime shortly after the blue jays return in full force to our canopy, we know the blackberries will be in bloom, and the wild grapes will not only sprout plentiful foliage, but there will also be plenty of little clusters of baby grapes.

And the long, dark winter of the blog is hopefully over, too.  For plenty of reasons, we have not written much lately.  Knock on wood, that may change soon; we’ll certainly have plenty of things to talk about, particularly on the beekeeping front, as we have experienced our first tragic die-off… and have learned many, many things as a consequence.  Our new colony will be installed in May, and we should definitely have a lot more to say about bees leading up to that event.

In the meantime, enjoy some photographic evidence of Spring…

Happy farming!