Chicken clipping, hummingbird moth, bee oversight, instructor, Grant

Mama and I took the time to clip the wings of our chickens last night. It is not a difficult task, and it causes no discomfort to the chicken, but that did not stop Mama wincing as I repeated the process on each and every hen. Of our sixty or so hens, we clipped wings on about thirty-five. Some are too heavy to fly, and some are not at all predisposed to get into the garden. However, the ten or so that seem to find a way into the garden have caused noticeable damage to several rows of our sprouting plants. Hopefully, the inability to fly over the fence will discourage them from aiming their attention that direction.

In our haste to wrap up the hourlong chore of getting the hens one by one off the roost in the dark and clipping one wing of each, then returning them to the roost, Mama and I did not think about closing the coop doors or the gate to the coop yard. So, you can imagine our surprise as we were making our morning pot of coffee to see hens wandering into the front yard to feast under the bird feeders hanging there. It is a normal trek for the hens but not typically until we open them in the late afternoon. Our bad. At least, the chickens are less likely to get into the garden which would be a problem having given them the entire day to mill about the farm.

As I was watering yesterday evening, a watched a Hummingbird Moth tend to the flowers on our Blueberry plants. I have seen them before but not here at the farm. We ran into a whole group of them in Palo Duro Canyon when we lived in Amarillo. I tried to get out my phone to video the moth, but it moved on very quickly. In all the hubbub of the evening, I forgot to tell Mama about it, so it was interesting this morning when she came to show me a video someone had sent to her of a Hummingbird Moth at one of their flowerbeds. Of course, I got fussed at for not disclosing my encounter the previous evening. But I was quickly forgiven. Maybe I will be better prepared if there is a future opportunity to capture my own record of the large insect.

I spent about half an hour observing the hives yesterday in the late afternoon. There was sufficient activity at each of the hives to assure me that they are doing well. One is far stronger that the other but even the weaker hive has enough bees coming in with loads of pollen to verify they are preparing for the feeding of brood that will soon be hatching. On the more robust hive, I will look for swarm cells in the next couple days. I believe that hive is very crowded, and they might be preparing to make a new queen and take a portion of the bee population out of their current hive to start in a new location.

That is not a bad thing, but it does hinder the bees remaining with the current from having enough bees left in the hive to produce excess honey. Since that excess honey is what we are looking for, we like to circumvent the swarm process and keep our hives full of bees. I am prepared to take a split from the hive should that be needed. That will limit the number of bees taken from the current hive but still provide enough bees for the new hive to get off to a good start.

At the office yesterday, a fellow instructor and I interviewed a potential candidate for an additional instructor role. He was a very pleasant gentleman. Raised on a farm, a degree in Ag Science, ten years as a County Extension Agent, and twenty-eight years as an Ag teacher. We spent more than an hour talking, asking, and answering questions. He seems to be one of those individuals that consider themselves life-long learners. He was a little apprehensive that his background in oil and gas is very limited, but that is the case for most of the employees currently in our organization. Other than myself and one other individual, no one in the company ever worked out in the field for the oil and gas industry. My hunch is that I will begin training him very soon. He is a rare find.

I will be teaching a class tomorrow. This will be an in-person class. A small one, which is fun because everyone knows from the start that they will be required to participate. Another instructor is teaching an all-day class today because I was scheduled to teach a half-day class today. That class was cancelled last week because we did not have anyone register for it. That does not happen very often in most of our class offerings, but with that particular class we have not had a huge success in marketing that content yet. That may change once the abbreviated content is presented at our conference this summer, but for now we are struggling with that one.

Grant is beginning a twenty-four-hour heart monitoring test this morning. Please pray for him and Cori as they deal with this added inconvenience in their lives. It certainly is a necessary diagnostic endeavor, but with everything else Cori is coordinating, it just adds a little more detail to an already overly broad focus on Cori’s part. Thankfully it is only twenty-four hours. For good or for bad, they should have the results later this week. Despite the challenges, God is good.

It is humbling to look back on Mama’s and my experience raising our seven children and realize just how amazingly good God was and has continued be to us.