By Margaret Sloan, Sunset production coordinator

Last Friday we went out to inspect the hives, count brood and bees, and check on the honey super (the box of small frames used strictly for honey production for our One-Block Diet).

Were we surprised! The frames in the honey super were filling in nicely. We  put it in about 6 weeks ago, but we had been cautioned that we would probably not get honey our first year. But there it was. One frame was mostly capped, and the others were full, or nearly full of nectar, and partially capped. At this rate, we thought, in another month we’ll be harvesting the whole super.

Then we put the super aside and started pulling frames from Veronica, looking for baby bees.

Nope, no babies, but lots and lots and lots of honey. Every frame in Veronica was full of lovely capped frames of honey. We must be having one heck of a nectar flow. A whole box of honey. My mouth was watering.

But this is not all good; there should be eggs and brood in this box. Bees can get honeybound, boxing their brood area in with honey so the hive can’t grow, which encourages them to swarm.  To give them room, we pulled 4 frames of honey and replaced them with empty frames. Purely to help the bees. Honestly.

And Yay! The honey is good. It’s great! Now we’re ready to eat ... I mean, process it.

By Johanna Silver, Sunset test garden coordinator

I did it again. I harvested a crop without taking a picture of the action. But just like the potatoes, I was too excited to stop.

Our Thompson’s Seedless have seen better days. My predecessor, Ryan Casey of Blue House Farm, thinks that a gopher got to the root stalk.

The Chardonnay vine, however, looks great.

Like corn, grapes are a new crop for me. A few weeks ago I ran into Ryan and asked him how I’ll know when the grapes are ready. A man of few (yet wise) words, he replied, “When they taste sweet.” Fair enough.

That turned out to be all the advice I needed. I popped one in my mouth today while I was hand-watering some containers nearby and - WHOA - bursts of sweet grape juice in my mouth! I snipped them all off and shared them with the staff inside. We had around ten bunches - not enough for wine, but enough for a snack.

I’ve been reading up on proper grapevine training and will post again in the dormant season when it’s time to prune back and setup successful vines for next year.

By Margo True, Sunset food editor

While scavenging for squash and chiles yesterday in the garden, I noticed our nasturtiums. They grow in clumps wherever there's water. No one plants them--they just sprout, starting in spring and carrying through most of the summer. I picked some, big spicy leaves and peppery bright flowers both.

Tossed with some baby lettuces I had in the fridge and a light rice-wine-vinegar dressing, they made a wonderful salad. Now I'll have to restrain myself when walking by their pretty beds. I could really eat them all.

By Kimberley Burch, Sunset imaging specialist

It’s busy around the office this week.  We are in the middle of creating our October issue, and it takes an effort to find time to check on our girls during these days. 
It was only 24 hours ago that Margaret and I gave them fresh water and decided they were doing well.  Well, this afternoon Veronica is covered in ants.  I only meant to step out for a moment, (and even went out in black pants and no veil!)  and found myself squishing ants on the hives as quickly as I could while filling the anti-ant containers with more fresh water.
Perhaps a container lid fell down to make contact with the container, giving the ants access to the hive.  Perhaps the water in the containers was dusty, giving the ants a platform in which to walk.  Perhaps the stubborn ants formed a bridge themselves to climb up to the sweetness.  Whatever it was, they reminded me today it takes a daily check to stay on top of those ants!

by Johanna Silver, Sunset test garden coordinator

A while back I posted about planting the corn and soybeans together. The results are in:

The soybean on the right was intercropped between rows of corn. The corn shaded out the beans as it grew, making the plant more stressed, less bushy, and less productive. The soybean on the left, planted in a sunny patch free of corn, did a lot better.

The corn, on the other hand, didn't seem to mind the beans one bit:

This was actually my first time growing corn, and I had to read up on how to tell when it's ready.

1. Make notice of when the tassels first emerge:

2. Approximately three weeks later they turn brown:

3. The corn should be ready. You can test by peeling back the husk and checking. Pierce a kernel with your fingernail. Clear liquid means it's not ready. Thick and pasty means you waited too long. A milky liquid is what you're after.

Ours was perfect.

I did just what the literature says and rushed it home for dinner. You want to eat fresh corn before the sugar turns into starch. It was absolutely amazing. Like nothing I've ever tasted before. So fresh. So sweet. I'm hooked.

By Margaret Sloan, Sunset production coordinator

This is a cool photo showing the bees on a drone frame. See that long string of bees? They are chaining, which is how they determine how best to build a comb. This is the drone frame, the only frame that we use that doesn't have pre-built foundation. The bees will build comb with drone-size cells (you can see the beginning of it in the photo), and the queen will lay unfertilized eggs which will hatch into drone larvae. (Amazingly, only the worker bees are from fertilized eggs.)

If you live on the San Francisco Peninsula, and you're interested in learning more about bees, the Beekeepers Guild Of San Mateo County will have a booth at the San Mateo County Fair (Aug 8-17). They're planning on having "a live observation bee hive, many types of honey for sale, and a few real live beekeepers."

By Margo True, Sunset food editor

We're harvesting from the garden practically every day now. Cucumbers, corn, tomatoes, edamame, and a small army of pattypan squash—they're all on the table. There is the occasional letdown. But so much else makes up for it! For instance, these cucumbers.

I picked little ones—about 4 inches long—from our 'Diva' vines, which test garden coordinator Johanna Silver has cleverly trained to grow up a trellis so they don't flop all over the place.

Young vegetables are another perk of gardening yourself. You can buy little vegetables, of course, but they rapidly lose their vitality once picked—even faster than mature vegetables do, I've found. Eat the little ones a few hours off the vine and you'll have a reward for all your faithful watering and weeding.

These little divas were probably the best cucumbers I've had. They were extremely crisp and sweet, with not a trace of that typical cucumbery bitterness. I didn't really do anything to them. I just sliced them and put them on a platter with a few of our juicy Early Girl tomatoes and some slivered basil, coarse salt and fresh pepper, and plenty of our own extra-virgin olive oil.

You often hear vintners proclaiming that their wines are made in the vineyard.

This salad was made in the garden.

Our one-block feast

By Margaret Sloan, Sunset production coordinator

The comb in the drone frame had a 5-inch long by 1-inch wide band of capped honey across the bottom of the comb. Yay! Honey!

We cut out the clean comb (avoiding the dead drone bodies) and mashed it in a sieve to strain the honey overnight. By the next morning we had about a half a cup ready for tasting.

But would it taste like the mite treatment we put in the hive last month?

Thymol is the active ingredient in Apiguard, and it makes the honey taste like Listerine. It supposedly won't hurt you—it's used as an herbal remedy and antiseptic for many things, including mouthwash and toothpaste. People on the Bee Source forum say that the Thymol will volatize off the comb and honey if it's left in the sun to air out.

Funny thing was, those of us who had experienced the taste of Thymol (when applying it, we'd accidentally gotten it on our gloves, veils, and, worst of all, into our mouths) thought we could taste a little bit of it. But other people didn't notice anything, although they did comment on how "intense" the honey tasted.

But really, on a toasted English muffin with some butter, our first honey wasn't that bad. Not bad at all.