Our weekly Snippets column is a collection of short items: responses to posted articles, practical self-sufficiency items, how-tos, lessons learned, tips and tricks, and news items — both from readers and from SurvivalBlog’s editors. Note that we may select some long e-mails for posting as separate letters.
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Mark J. in Oregon wrote:
“I run honey bees. I have 16 hives going. Russian bee genetics. I get the queens from Foley in Iowa. They don’t get the mites… they fly in 45 degree weather — snow and rain…. They don’t have hive collapse. The first queen I got was pure black. A called her “Natasha”. The workers are generally brown/black or pure black markings. I’m trying to avoid feeding sugar water and so forth…see how much they can produce without help. I usually fog two treatments, twice a year with oxylic acid, veg glycerine…a shot of vodka to help emulsify. You have to treat twice…first time kills the open mites. ~ 30 days later you fog again to get the mites that were laid with the eggs when the bees hatch. Mites like to lay in the drone brood the most.
I canned up some hot salsa out of the garden. Fermenting the store-bought chicken feed to make it ‘alive’ again. Trying the Southern home-made “7-Up / Sprite” recipe. That one is a handful of cleaned and trimmed pine needles in a quart mason jar. 1/4 cup sugar. Let it ferment for 5 days. All the old rural folks say it’s really good as far as taste.”
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Hamas Agrees to Ceasefire-Hostage Release Deal With Israel.
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Reader R.T. sent this summer gardening report:
“Our small backyard garden, not far from the central Minnesota and Wisconsin river border, has had it’s unique challenges this year; not enough sunlight, not enough rain and now too much rain and still not enough sunlight due to Canadian smoke and storms. Last summer drought-like conditions is to blame for our rhubarb patch and asparagus not even bothering to make an effort this year. Now with buckets of rain (which we maintain under the eaves) there is a lot of foliage but the tomatoes are small and struggling to ripen.
The green Provider beans that we got from SurvivalBlog vendor “Seed for Security” going out of business sale last year are living up to their name. Their eggplant seeds are also doing well. We’ve canned dilly beans plus have them frequently at meals. We decided to can, but not ferment, our cukes this year. We have switched to using the steam canner as it uses considerably less energy than the water bath canner with similar results. We’ve had to replant the beets several times until they sprouted, too dry at first. The dry weather attracted flocks of sparrows to burrow up the soil where we had planted to “bathe” themselves. Now the carrot worms are eating the tops. We haven’t had a problem with rabbits this year after fortifying the fence. Strong gusts of wind toppled our fruit-laden pepper plants, but they were rescued and survived.
We are very thankful for having the garden as we also have relied upon the local farmer’s market but due to the weather this year some products are not showing up and often the market has not shown up due to a stormy session. Like I heard Roseanne Roseannadanna say back when I used to listen to Saturday Night Live some 45 years ago “It just goes to show you, it’s always something. If it’s not a thing, it’s another.”
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The Reduction of Kerosene Lamp Emissions through Solar Lighting. (Thanks to F.J. for the link.)
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