Original Transplants Episode 25

Original Transplants

Episode 25 of the Original Transplants podcast - Nor'easter edition! - features Satoyama Homestead stewards Sarah and Will reviewing the Chester County [PA] Beekeeping Association's 2017 Annual Conference and discussing plans for the 2017 apiary. Will looks forward to experimenting with splits and other proactive colony management strategies, and Sarah questions the logic of scapegoating small-scale treatment free beekeepers for the prevalence of varroa and other pests in commercial bee yards. Sarah updates listeners on the status of the chicken coop and explains the importance of supportive nutrition for chickens during the winter. She then cops to 'equinox exuberance' and describes her vegetable seedling starting project in the midst of a late season blizzard. The Satoyama stewards recommend some late winter chores, including cleaning and sharpening tools, autopsying hive deadouts and evaluating and scraping bee equipment, and processing wood from last year's tree work. We then review agricultural and environmental news from Lancaster Farming and Nature.com on the topics of small-scale agriculture with unusual berries, breakthroughs in honeybee genetics for immunity, the importance of 4-H and inspiring youth, and initiative to purge invasive pests from New Zealand. Find out more at http://spreadcasts.tumblr.com and http://www.satoyamahs.org.