Up until I got my first dog at age 50, I would have told you I was a “cat person”, but once we got Bear, and then added Bella a year later, I was hooked. I can’t imagine ever being without a dog again. Bear and Bella were both golden doodles. We decided on doodles …
Author Archives: Becky
Weed wars
Life at Green Acres is filled with many simple pleasures: things like living next door to my best friend; long walks with the dogs; tapioca made with goat milk and duck eggs; evening strolls with the goats; ducks who boldly join the goat walk as we pass the pond, delighted to return to the security …
The Honey Flow
I have previously written about harvesting honey Nothing else in beekeeping is quite like watching the bees turn nectar into liquid gold, so I can’t resist doing it again! As nectar and pollen producing trees and flowers start to bloom in the spring, honey bees take advantage of the expanding food sources to raise more …
Heroic Hugh
Having made the decision to let our chickens free range, we have accepted the risk that they may fall victim to predators. We have lost chickens to hawks, and raccoons, and occasionally to an unknown, when one just doesn’t come home. Each time, I struggle with my decision to let them wander and after a …
Bad decisions and bouncing bee boxes
In my next life, I am going to come back as a person who is good at just leaving well enough alone. It might keep me out of trouble! For those of you who have read some of my prior stories, you will know that May is swarm season in Michigan. Swarming is the way …
Bee Poop
Have you ever been pooped on by a honey bee? Walk past a beehive on a warm, winter day, following a long cold spell, and you probably will be! Bees will do everything they can to avoid pooping inside the hive, and they can hold it a LONG time. In the winter, when cold weather …
Winter worries 2025
I continue in my role as the editor of the Michigan Beekeepers Association Newsletter, and in that role, I write a short editor’s introduction for the newsletter each quarter. Sometimes those pieces seem appropriate to share as a farm story as well. I think this one qualifies. Editor’s Musings: As I sit down to put …
Too many goodbyes
Since we said goodbye to Bear in December, 2023, it feels like we have said too many goodbyes to the 4-legged companions in our lives: to Ditto, our sweet twenty year old cat, to Ichabod, our five year old “companion” goat, and last week to Bella, our beloved thirteen year old goldendoodle. Ditto’s mother, Patches, …
Farm mothers… or not
With our oldest ‘mama’ goat expecting kids again in the next few days, my mind is drawn to motherhood on the farm, so I thought I would share one of our recent “mothering” adventures. Those of you who have read my prior stories know fostering chicks with a broody hen is a useful alternative to …
Tail feathers
The backyard is littered with feathers …. and a reliable eyewitness reports that the perpetrator of the attempted murder was a member of our household. Meet Willow. She is a Bernedoodle, who joined us in Decembers, at age 7 months, and will be one year old next week. Although she is our third dog, she is …