No real news this morning, just a sobering thought. We leave for a 10 trip in 3 1/2 weeks. We have, of course the most fabulous housesitter, who will take excellent care of the furred and feathered, but she could not be expected to open the beehive and check for intruders.
I'll have her watch the essential oil and syrup supply, in case the bees need that (they aren't taking any of it presently), but apart from offering extra food, Beedicca will be on her own for that period of time. The intervening time is not enough for me to try rescue methods like introducing a new queen, or giving them a bar of brood from a healthy hive of the same stock--two things I have been considering, since I'm more and more convinced we have no queen.
It will be a sink or swim moment. When we get back, it will evident whether this hive will thrive or die.
The RIR teenagers are starting to behave badly. Binky can still shut them down with one steely glance, and the hens are still capable of chasing the cheeky punks off, but that won't last forever.
The boys--Jordan, James, and Andy--made a pact last week to take the roos over to Greg's sometime in October for a lesson in turning roosters into meat. I hope they will all do some research into humane killing, though, because Greg's a hunter; he knows how to dress a bird, but it's a bird he shot. Jordan is going to have to chop a neck or slit a throat himself.
I don't feel too good about the whole thing. It's not that I think everyone should be vegetarian. For one thing, I think the human relationship with domesticated animals is a beautiful thing. Or, at least, it should be, and can be. Like practically everything else modern people do, we've made a travesty of it with factory farms and cloned calves and such widespread use of antibiotics that the entire world is flooded with them; not to mention slaughter houses full of illegal immigrant workers who are exploited nearly as badly as the animals they process. But let's imagine a biodynamic farm where the animals have all the space, sunlight, and company they need to live authentic, comfortable lives. Where hens get to raise families, pigs can forage in oak woods, and calves can run around pastures. Where they come to their deaths as respectfully as possible after enjoying a pleasant life under the care and protection of kind humans.
A person has only to hang out with backyard chickens for a little while to recognize, we have a common language. Our inflections are so similar, even though they are tiny dinosaurs and we are jumped up primates. It's because we have evolved together. Just like dogs and cats, cows, pigs, horses, sheep, goats, camels. Of all the bazillion species of animals in the world, only a few are considered domesticated. We're symbiotic with them. They are symbiotic with us. We're symbionts. What could be more sacred than the interdependence of species?
I've always said: if you are going to eat meat, you should at least face up to where is comes from, and kill your own meals. Now that Jordan is willing to put this high-minded theory into practice, well, it's a test.
My opinions about diet are similar to those I hold about religion: it's your business, and I'll try to leave you alone about it. But now we've gone past theory and it's my husband, and my roosters.
And I'm uncomfortable.
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