Manchester – Francois et Moi

The Great Labor Day Honey Harvest + 4 Easy Ways to Help the Bees!

francoisetmoiblog@gmail.com — Fri, 22 Sep 2017 18:51:39 +0000

Over Labor Day, we spent the weekend at my husband, Ken’s family farm in Manchester, Iowa harvesting honey from my father-in-law’s bee hives. Every year it’s a collective effort gathering the hive frames, using heat to open up the wax honeycomb, spinning the honey from the frames, and bottling it up. Being this close to the harvesting process, has given me such an appreciation for the honey bees. Their social hierarchy, the work they do pollinating flowers, and collecting nectar & turning it into honeycomb is just all around fascinating. And I was surprised to find over the years, that unlike wasps, the bees are actually incredibly gentle and unlikely to sting. My husband, Ken, even got a bee in his bee suit one year and wasn’t stung! Bees make it possible for us to enjoy a variety of foods as they help with the reproduction of upwards of 75% of flowering plants and crops. Unfortunately, our honey bee numbers were down this year at the farm, and it’s part of a larger trend due to a combination of stress factors including loss of habitat, parasites and diseases, and pesticide exposure. Without the bees many of our crops and flowers […]

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Photo Diary: Farm Exploration

francoisetmoiblog@gmail.com — Mon, 21 Apr 2014 12:50:34 +0000

Good morning! No words today, just pictures to tell the story of our weekend at the farm…

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Easter at the Farm

francoisetmoiblog@gmail.com — Fri, 18 Apr 2014 12:39:00 +0000

Another week has come and gone. Easter is upon us, and we’re headed south to the Francois Family farm to celebrate the Holiday weekend with Ken’s family. It’s a 4 hour drive from here, but it feels more than a world away, a far cry from the bustling city streets of Minneapolis. Life is simpler, time moves a bit slower, and the abundant fresh air and wide open spaces welcome you in, wrap you up solitude and, like clockwork, the stress from the week begins to melt away. Pictured are a few moments I captured last fall during a visit to the farm just after the first snowfall of the year. I’m hoping we’ll be able to detect a few signs of Spring there this weekend (Although I have a sneaky feeling the landscape may look frighteningly similar to these photos!). Enjoy the weekend, and we’ll see you on Monday!

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