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Homestead Updates

April 25, 2012 By RDG

Painting Bee Hives

Green hive body with paint can next to it.
I use a high quality exterior latex paint to paint my hives green. (click to enlarge)

After assembling deep hive bodies, I painted them. I paint all my hives green because it is different than the standard white you see everywhere. I also think greenĀ  helps the hives blend in better with their surroundings.

My paint process is to start with the best water based exterior latex primer and paint I can find. I use a coat of primer because primer is less expensive than paint. Then I apply two coats of flat green paint. I like to put my honey supers and other beekeeping equipment on cardboard as a kind of drop cloth. I let them dry overnight in the barn between coats.

Starting An Asparagus Bed

Close up of purple passion asparagus.
Why grow ordinary colored asparagus, when purple is available?

I wanted to start an asparagus bed last year, but with the preparations for chickens, I put it off. It reminds me of the best time to plan a fruit tree…twenty years ago. The second best time is today. Yesterday, I spoke with the folks at Daisy Farms in Michigan. I ordered 25 of their purple passion asparagus. I will plant it in the square foot garden bed I weeded the other day.

Related Pages

  • Jig For Assembling Hive Bodies And Honey Supers
  • Storing Honey Supers
  • Grass Is A Weed In A Garden Bed
  • Lessons Learned Gardening In 2011
  • Homestead Updates For May 20, 2012

What color do you paint your hives? Do you grow asparagus? Let me know in the comments section below.

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Filed Under: beekeeping, Gardening Tagged With: asparagus, beekeeping, gardening, paint

Comments

  1. Joe Z says

    April 26, 2012 at 3:41 am

    Are you going to follow these asparagus instructions and not harvest until 2 years from now?

    http://web.extension.illinois.edu/fjprw/downloads/5599.pdf

    • RDG says

      April 26, 2012 at 12:24 pm

      Joe,

      Indeed. From what I have read it is important to let the bed get established. I will wait two year until harvesting the asparagus. That is why I wish I planted the bed years ago.

      The upside is (as mentioned in the pdf you linked) that as a perennial, the asparagus should produce for 15 years or more.

      -RDG

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