Hi, I’m Amy.
I don’t actually run a farm – just a wonderful little garden in my backyard in Washington, DC. My backyard is under 1,000 square feet. In that space, I have a 100 square foot garden plot (supplemented by various containers and flower beds) and a beehive! I love gardening and beekeeping. If you do too, maybe you’ll like some of the things I share.
My Garden History
When I was a little kid, my grandpa had a wonderful vegetable garden in Mt. Vernon, Indiana. Some of my most vivid childhood memories are rooted in that garden. I remember how much my cousins loved the okra from the garden and how much I hated it. The smell of fresh green beans makes me feel like I’m back at my grandma’s table helping her pop the ends off a giant batch of green beans. And I can’t think about my grandma without remembering that she would always get out a jar of tomatoes and blend it to make fresh tomato juice for me. That tomato juice memory is probably the only real reason I can tomatoes today despite how labor intensive it can be (especially versus buying a can at the grocery store).
While I was in college my grandfather passed (my grandmother had passed years earlier) and I was disconnected from gardening for a while. After college, I spent a few years in Indianapolis where I started a container garden on a neighbor’s front stoop. Before I finished my first garden season and could really enjoy my harvest, my wife and I moved to Washington DC. The container garden was bequeathed to the hosting neighbor.
Once in DC, I wanted to join a community garden. All of the waiting lists were years long. A few years in, I was fortunate to have an opportunity to help start a new community garden and to secure a coveted spot. I spent a year and a half cultivating my 3’x9′ plot and participating in community activities. It was amazing! But also a little stressful – our community garden came with an unnecessary level of drama (I hear this may be common among other community gardens).
When we had the opportunity in the summer of 2014 to buy a house, my only home requirement was a yard with plenty of sun and room for a garden. We were fortunate to find the perfect spot in Southeast DC. Eight months after moving in, my brother and I rented a jackhammer and tore out all of the concrete in the backyard – starting what would be a two year project to create a backyard oasis. The first thing I did after removing the concrete was to rent a tiller to work the soil for my garden patch. My first garden season at the house started in the Spring of 2015.
Since then, I’ve gardened every year. We live in Zone 7, so planting begins at the start of March and I’m usually harvesting things through at least November. We’ve tried growing everything – tomatoes, lettuce, greens, carrots, radishes, turnips, cabbage, tomatillos, peppers, zucchini, squash, cantaloupe, watermelon, sunflowers, corn, beans, peas, green beans, pumpkins, and more.
My Beekeeping History
I’ve been drawn to beekeeping for years. In May 2010, I came to DC to hunt for an apartment in preparation for our impending move. It was a 3-day trip and by the second day I had found a new temporary home. I searched online for something interesting to do on the third day. The Franciscan Monastery in the Brookland neighborhood was hosting a honey extraction workshop. So, I went and met some beekeepers and was hooked.
It wasn’t until we had the house that I could really pursue my beekeeping dream. And it wasn’t until I was finished overhauling the backyard that I could realistically put in a beehive. I also needed those few years to convince my wife to allow me to fill our yard with bees.
In April 2017, I got my first package of bees. 2017 was a crazy year for beekeeping – many more swarms than normal were reported around the city. It’s very unusual for a first year hive to grow fast enough to swarm. But mine did. In fact, I had two swarms in my first year.
The first swarm happened while I was out of town for work. Someone from the DC Beekeeper’s Alliance came and collected it – it was rehived at an elementary school nearby. The second swarm happened on a weekend while I was home – again someone from the swarm team came out, but this time he helped coach me through catching the swarm myself. I rehived it in a second hive in my backyard. But eventually that hive lost its queen and developed a laying worker situation. So, I had to shake out the laying workers and combine the foragers into my original hive.
I started Winter 2017-2018 with one strong hive. Unfortunately, it didn’t survive the winter. I got new bees in late June 2018. So far, they’re doing great!
