Bountiful Berries and Buzzing Bees

 by Breanne Bartok

I think I’ve eaten more berries in the last two weeks of Farm Camp than I have in at least the last five years. It’s easy to be excited about the weekly bounty of berries we get to pluck for our snack! 

I’m not the only one who loves feasting on fresh food from the forest garden; this week, we made Veggie Spring Rolls with many of the raspberries, blackberries, and blueberries that grow in the garden. Drizzle on a little bit of honey to celebrate our theme of Pollinators, attempt to keep the rice paper from bunching up before it’s ready to be rolled, and you’ve got one delicious snack! One younger camper even went home begging his grownups for Spring Rolls, prompting the entire family to make fresh, veggie-filled rolls for dinner! 

Wednesday continued to sprout new ideas for campers. We had a visit with our very own “Beeman,” Michael, who, clad in his white bee suit, let us taste some fresh honey from the Outback hives. He showed us the smoker he uses to trick the bees into thinking fire is nearby, then eating large amounts of honey for nutrition in case they need to flee the hive. They usually eat too much to move, though, so he can work with the hive while they work through their food coma. After some of our snacks this week – like the Crunchy Bean Tacos on Thursday – many of us could relate! 

Our campers loved trying the fresh honey and drizzling it on their snacks. Like the first week of Farm Camp, they also couldn’t get enough of the chickens! Between our feathered fowl, thorny thistle, grueling Morning Glory, and beloved bees, we have a farm full of “garden friends” and “garden foes” – and by the end of the week, many of the campers were experts at identifying not only friend or foe, but species and botanical uses for it. The conversations on uses of lemon balm and plantain may not have been quite as exciting as actually harvesting the fresh plums and kale, but making crafts, like our Garden Stained Glass, out of the living environment helped open eyes to new ways we can benefit from having so much greenery around us!