Backyard Bounty

Queen Honey Bee Fertility Research is our topic for this episode of Backyard Bounty podcast as we join Nicole and Alison McAfee.

What You’ll Learn

• How temperature fluctuations can affect queen honey bee fertility
• What research is currently being conducted in the Queen Honey Bee Fertility area
• The best place to source your Queen Bees

Our Guest

Alison has a Bachelor’s in biochemistry and did her PhD in genome science and technology at UBC. For that, she studied hygienic behavior which is where honey bees sacrifice their diseased babies to keep them from getting everyone else sick.

She is currently appointed at both UBC and NCSU, studying queen health and reproduction.

Alison is also a science writer and writes a monthly column for American Bee Journal and has had freelance pieces appear in Scientific American.

Resources & Links Mentioned

• Alison’s Website and Twitter
• Find your local Beekeeping Association

You May Also Like

Research Updates on Oxalic Acid For Bees & More ft Randy Oliver of Scientific Beekeeping

Support The Show

Your support helps us continue to provide the best possible episodes!

• Find video episodes on YouTube
• Subscribe to the podcast email newsletter
• Submit a question or suggestion for the show
• Shop Backyard Bounty merchandise
• Join our text community (719) 292- 3207
• Get behind the scenes with Patreon
• Find us online @HeritageAcresMarket: Website / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / Gab / Pinterest

This week on the Backyard Bounty podcast we bring you something a little different as Nicole joins Brad from Coop Dreams TV for their Teaching Tuesday Facebook live event

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• Guinea Fowl and things to things to consider you get started
• Fermenting feed why you should do it
• How Nicole got started with Heritage Acres Market
• What to keep on your chicken first aid kit

OUR GUEST

Coop Dreams is a TV series for anyone that ever chased a dream. Or wanted backyard chickens…or goats…or bees…or a garden.

RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED

• Coop Dreams TV Facebook, Website, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube Channel
• Where to watch Coop Dreams TV
• *Berkley Water Filters
• *Watering Nipples
• * Backyard Poultry Health ebook

*Denotes affiliate links

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE

How To Raise Chickens ft Annette of Azure Farm

SUPPORT THE SHOW

Your support helps us continue to provide the best possible episodes!

• Find video episodes on YouTube
• Subscribe to the podcast email newsletter
• Submit a question or suggestion for the show
• Shop Backyard Bounty merchandise
• Join our text community (719) 292- 3207
• Get behind the scenes with Patreon
• Find us online @HeritageAcresMarket: Website / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / Gab / Pinterest

Join Nicole as she answers some common backyard chicken questions from Backyard Bounty podcast listeners.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• Effects of light on rearing chicks and egg production
• How to introduce new chickens to your flock
• How to water cheaply and easily

OUR GUEST

Nicole is a Colorado native and an outdoor enthusiast. A retired firefighter/paramedic, Heritage Acres Market, and her family are now her main focus. When not working on the farm, she enjoys creating new content for the blog and recording new episodes of the Backyard Bounty Podcast.

RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED

• Text Nicole with your questions 719 292 3207
• Leave your questions for future Q & A episodes on Speakpipe
• Introducing new chickens
• Frostbite
• Link to Wintertime Webinar by Univ of Penn
• Summertime feed
• Brooder light
• Raising mealworms
• Fermenting feed
• Ultimate list of what chickens feed
• *Chicken nipples product and Informational post
• *Essential nutrients seed blend
• *Sweeter Heater

*Denotes affiliate links

SUPPORT THE SHOW

Your support helps us continue to provide the best possible episodes!

• Find video episodes on YouTube
• Subscribe to the podcast email newsletter
• Submit a question or suggestion for the show
• Shop Backyard Bounty merchandise
• Join our text community (719) 292- 3207
• Get behind the scenes with Patreon
• Find us online @HeritageAcresMarket: Website / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / Gab / Pinterest

Join Nicole and Megan from Creative Vegetable Gardener as they discuss easy food preservation in this week’s Backyard Bounty podcast.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• Types of easy food preservation
• How to store fresh vegetables
• What to preserve to make preparing your dinner easier!
• How to plan a garden to make sure you have enough food to preserve.

OUR GUEST

Megan is a garden educator, speaker, and writer and has been running The Creative Vegetable Gardener for about 8 years and has been gardening for 20 years! She lives in zone 5, Madison, WI.

Megan offers simple & easy gardening advice focused on helping people get better results from their garden. Her mission in life is to help gardeners cut through the noise of all the overcomplicated gardening advice out there by keeping it simple.

Megan always focuses on the essentials first, helping gardeners skip over the common mistakes by stripping things back to the basics, making sure you’re growing more food, and getting the results you want.

She’ll help bring more pleasure to the whole gardening experience by guiding people into delving more deeply into the beautiful details of gardening with some fun experimentation.

RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED

• The Creative Vegetable Gardener Website, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest
• Creative Vegetable Gardener Learning Center
• Super Easy Food Preserving book
• Free mini-course: Get Started Stocking Your Pantry for Winter
• Masterclass: Fill Your Pantry From Your Garden

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE

Most Important Steps To Growing A Healthy Garden ft Joe Gardener

SUPPORT THE SHOW

Your support helps us continue to provide the best possible episodes!

• Find video episodes on YouTube
• Subscribe to the podcast email newsletter
• Submit a question or suggestion for the show
• Shop Backyard Bounty merchandise
• Join our text community (719) 292- 3207
• Get behind the scenes with Patreon
• Find us online @HeritageAcresMarket: Website / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / Gab / Pinterest

Cast iron skillets are our topic for this week's Backyard Bounty podcast as we join Nicole and Stephen the pan man and Co-Founder of Field Company

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• The differences between old and new cast iron
• How to properly use and care for cast iron regardless of age
• How to cook with cast Iron
• How to recondition old pans
• Some common misconceptions when it comes to using cast iron

OUR GUEST

Stephen started the Field Company with his brother in 2015. They make a lighter, smoother cast iron skillet like your grandma had.

Stephen is passionate about making and using high-quality tools that enable folks to roll up their sleeves and take matters into their own hands. The goal with Field Company is to make things right, meaning Field Company has very high-quality standards, only using natural materials, and paying close attention to the making and manufacturing process. The company believes that if the process isn’t elegant, the end result rarely is! They apply this belief to their cast iron cookware and to everything that they make.

The two main features Field Skillet brought back to cast iron are the smooth cooking surface and lighter weight, which is common in older cast iron. They also wanted to make a beautiful object that feels great in your hands and makes you want to use it daily.

RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED

• Field Company website, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram
• *Shop Field Company
• *Cast Iron: The Ultimate Book of the World’s Most Prized Cookware with More Than 300 International Recipes 

*Denotes affiliate links

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE

Small Space Gardening ft. Kevin from Epic Gardening

SUPPORT THE SHOW

Your support helps us continue to provide the best possible episodes!

• Find video episodes on YouTube
• Subscribe to the podcast email newsletter
• Submit a question or suggestion for the show
• Shop Backyard Bounty merchandise
• Join our text community (719) 292- 3207
• Get behind the scenes with Patreon
• Find us online @HeritageAcresMarket: Website / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / Gab / Pinterest

History of Beekeeping in North America is this week's topic on Backyard Bounty podcast as we join Nicole and Dr. Tammy Horn Potter.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• How honey bees made their way to North America
• What four inventions of the 1800’s are still used in beekeeping today
• How History of Beekeeping tells of using bees to defend against Vikings!

OUR GUEST

Tammy is the author of three books about honey bees: Bees in America, How the Honey Bee Shaped a Nation was published in 2005; Beeconomy: What Women and Bees teach us about Local Trade and Global Markets in 2012; and her most recent book Flower Power: Establishing Pollinator Habitat published in 2019.
She is also the Kentucky State Apiarist for the Kentucky Department of Agriculture and serves on serve on four boards related to bees: Honey Bee Health Coalition, Eastern Apiculture Society, Foundation for the Preservation of Honey Bees, and Project Apis M

RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED

• Tammy Horn Potter Facebook
• * Bees in America: How the Honey Bee Shaped a Nation
• * Beeconomy: What Women and Bees Can Teach Us about Local Trade and the Global Market
• * Flower Power: Establishing Pollinator Habitat 
• Tammy’s books are also available through the
• If you wish to get hold of Tammy for a hive inspection in the state of Kentucky please email [email protected] she generally needs about 2 weeks' notice.

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE

Information Overwhelm And The Beekeeping Beginner ft Charlotte of Carolina Honey Bees

SUPPORT THE SHOW

Your support helps us continue to provide the best possible episodes!

• Find video episodes on YouTube
• Subscribe to the podcast email newsletter
• Submit a question or suggestion for the show
• Shop Backyard Bounty merchandise
• Join our text community (719) 292- 3207
• Get behind the scenes with Patreon
• Find us online @HeritageAcresMarket: Website / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / Gab / Pinterest

SHOW NOTES

Join Nicole as she discusses raising pheasants with Chris of MacFarlane Pheasants in this week’s Backyard Bounty podcast.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• The nutritional needs of pheasants
• Why you should not raise pheasants with other birds
• Housing needs for pheasants

OUR GUEST

MacFarlane Pheasant is the largest pheasant farm in North America and will hatch over 2 million chicks each year. They raise 400,000 pheasants for release, 180k for food. Additionally, they raise 60k French partridge, 40k Hungarian partridge, and 20k chukar partridge.

Their chicks are sold Internationally, and mature birds are sold across the US and Canada.

RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED

• MacFarlane Pheasants website / Facebook
• MacFarlane Pheasants shop
• *Game Bird Breeders Handbook by Allen Woodard Pran Vohra & Vern Denton
• *The Pheasants of the World: Biology and Natural History

*Denotes affiliate links

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE

Prevention and Management of Common Backyard Chicken Predators ft Dr. Matt Springer

SUPPORT THE SHOW

Your support helps us continue to provide the best possible episodes!

• Find video episodes on YouTube
• Subscribe to the podcast email newsletter
• Submit a question or suggestion for the show
• Shop Backyard Bounty merchandise
• Join our text community (719) 292- 3207
• Get behind the scenes with Patreon
• Find us online @HeritageAcresMarket: Website / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / Gab / Pinterest

In this week’s Backyard Bounty podcast we learn how to grow microgreens as Nicole chats with Pamela of Sunshine Green’s Farm.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• How to grow microgreens 
• What you need to get started
• What are microgreens?
• The difference between microgreens sprouts
• How nutritious microgreens are
• The seeds you can grow into a microgreens
• The  seeds that are good for beginners

OUR GUEST

Sunshine Green’s Farm is a small, indoor vertical urban farm 3 blocks from downtown Colorado Springs. Initially, Pamela only offered 5 different types of microgreens but now grows and sells over 20 different types!

RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED

• Sunshine Green's Farm Website / Instagram 
• Sunshine Green’s Farm Shop – be sure to use Heritage10 for 10% off your first order
• Microgreen recipes
• Journal of Food Science, Microgreen nutrition, food safety, and shelf life
• Microgreen Seeding Density Calculator
• True Leaf Market
• Johnny’s Selected Seeds
• Mumm’s Sprouting Seeds
• *Seed trays
• *Coconut coir grow mats 
• *LED Grow lights

*Denotes affiliate links

YOU MAY ALSO LIKE

Growing Mushrooms at Home ft Josh & Megan of Megan’s Mushrooms

SUPPORT THE SHOW

Your support helps us continue to provide the best possible episodes!

• Find video episodes on YouTube
• Subscribe to the podcast email newsletter
• Submit a question or suggestion for the show
• Shop Backyard Bounty merchandise
• Join our text community (719) 292- 3207
• Get behind the scenes with Patreon
• Find us online @HeritageAcresMarket: Website / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / Gab / Pinterest

Pastured pigs and how to raise them on the homestead are featured in this week's podcast episode with your host Nicole and Chuck from Sheraton Park Farms.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• Why pastured pigs are a great addition to your homestead.
• Why you need a mentor before you start to raise your own pastured pigs.
• What you need to get started raising pigs.
• Get some great tips on getting started with raising pastured pigs.
• Are pigs really aggressive?

OUR GUEST

Chuck and his wife Saundra are first-generation farmers with over 25 years of experience in the healthcare industry as Paramedics and Registered Nursing.

Chuck and Saundra now farm 32 acres (20 owned and 12 leased) just outside the 3rd largest city in North Carolina. They love caring for the land, raising animals the right way, doing a good hard day’s work, and helping people feed their families quality food they can feel good about.

RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED

• Sheraton Park Farms website / Facebook / Instagram / YouTube
• The Grass-fed Life Podcast
• Farrow to Finish School by J & L Green Farm
• Joel Salatin Podcast from Backyard Bounty

*Denotes affiliate links

SUPPORT THE SHOW

Your support helps us continue to provide the best possible episodes!

• Find video episodes on YouTube
• Subscribe to the podcast email newsletter
• Submit a question or suggestion for the show
• Shop Backyard Bounty merchandise
• Join our text community (719) 292- 3207
• Get behind the scenes with Patreon
• Find us online @HeritageAcresMarket: Website / Facebook Page / Facebook Group / Instagram / TikTok / Twitter / Gab / Pinterest

Growing lavender is the topic of this week’s conversation as we join our host Nicole and Paola of Sage Creations Organic Farm.

WHAT YOU’LL LEARN

• Soil types lavender grows best in.
• Growing lavender for various usages.
• Diseases and pests to look out for.
• Suppressing weeds within your lavender crop.
• The life span of the lavender shrub.
• What to consider before growing lavender.

OUR GUEST

Paola has worked in organic farming and marketing for the last 25 years. In her commitment to organic farming and raising her family in Colorado’s clean air and wholesome way of life, she manages the farm and maintains lavender fields, 4000 feet of greenhouse space, medicinal herb crops, heirloom vegetables and a cherry orchard!

Paola has always had a love for herbs and vegetables and thought lavender would be a great crop for Colorado, and began her journey of growing lavender in 2006.

Over the years as lavender fields grew, Sage Creations extended their product line to include certified organic essential oils; lavender inspired home décor, bath, and body products, and lavender plant starts.

Sage Creations farms are 10 acres and currently has 6 acres in lavender production. They grow 3 species and over 60 different cultivars of lavender. For the last 11 years, the farm has been trialing different species and cultivars of lavender to see which is best suited for the South Western State’s climate and its different zones.

Sage Farmers works with numerous growers throughout Colorado and the Southwestern states. Their farm’s lavender plugs and plants have been sold throughout the US. In addition to propagating and distilling lavender.

RESOURCES & LINKS MENTIONED

• Sage Creations Organic Farm Website
• Sage Creations Organic Farm Facebook Page
• Sage Creations Organic Farm Instagram
• Sage Creations Organic Farm YouTube Channel
• Sage Creations Guide to Ordering Lavender for Spring Planting: What you need to know
• Michigan State University Growing Lavender Guide
• Lavender Association of Colorado
• US Lavender Growers Association

*Denotes affiliate links