What do I love more than opossum and sweet taters cooked on a pine board!

[rbinhood]

Yea! For all you Yankees who have never enjoyed this southern culinary delight it is the best thing since God created dirt.  On the other hand sometimes dirt taste better if the opossum is not prepared right!
What might this old goat be talking about you may ask, I am speaking about the dieing wonderful art of beelining.

A few days ago I was taking a hike in an area that joins the Talladega National Forest and stopped at a small stream to get a drink of the cold water at which time I saw several honeybees doing the same.  Knowing there were no homes or farms within a five or six mile radius I returned the next day with bee box and snuff can with flower in hand and started the search.

After a full day of hiking up one hill and down another at dusty dark I found and oak tree that was 71 hand around.  About 30 foot up a hole about the size of a large cantaloupe with bees flying in and out as thick as flies on a day old cow pattie.

I went back and setup a trapout and have since made three more treks in and out, two with five frame nuke boxes full of bees, each time I had to shake bees off the box and now have the fourth in place, and bees are still streaming out.  Talk about survivor stock and adding diversity to and apiary this will do it.  This has to be the largest colony of feral bees I have ever seen in my 72 years on the face of this earth.  I would like to post more pics but I only have the one I took the day I found the tree, somewhere along the way back in to setup the trapout I lost my camera or maybe my Alzheimer's kicked in and I laid it down and forgot where I put it.

http://img268.imageshack.us/img268/322/dsc03800g.jpg

[luvin honey]

That is very exciting--good for you!! That's my personal fantasy

[tefer2]

Hmmm, I can't see jack in that picture!

[rbinhood]

Sorry about that tefer2 by the time I got out of them there woods I could not see jack or squat either I had to feel my way out, got out at 9:25 pm.

[tefer2]

I thought it was my eyes !

[BlueBee]

I’m going to have to cry fowl on this thread.  It was a bait and switch!  

I was looking forward to a recipe for opossum and sweet taters…..

[beyondthesidewalks]

One day I got home from work kind of late and as I pulled into my driveway, I noticed a possum right in front of my truck.  I guess I startled it because it didn't move, playing dead.  I had to get out and get the mail so I went over and checked out the possum.  I picked it up by the tail and was holding it up just as a car pulled in behind me.  The driver got out and asked me where someone I had never heard of lived.  I told him i didn't know but that I'd just caught dinner and he was welcome to stay and eat if he wanted.  He got a scared look in his eyes, got in his car and drove off very fast.  It was very funny.  Sorry for the off topic post but the subject just reminded me of that story.

[luvin honey]

That's hilarious, Beyond

[AllenF]

 

[jmblakeney]

Bee lining is something I want to try and do this yr.

James

[rbinhood]

Alright here is the way to cook a opossum and sweet taters.....first catch your opossum put him in a cage and feed him nothing but water and swelled corn for about two weeks.  Slaughter and clean him, next soak the meat in a gallon of butter milk and a large bottle of Louisiana hot sauce overnight.  Next (this is key ingredient) get you a clean pine board that will cover the bottom of your roasting pan, generously apply salt, pepper, and a generous amount of Creole seasoning to the meat, place opossum on board and place sweet taters around the meat add about 2 inches of water to roasting pan and place in preheated 275 degree oven.

When the taters are done remove from oven remove opossum from pan and set aside, now you eat the pine board and sweet taters and feet the opossum to your dog.

NOW THAT IS GOOD EATS!

[tefer2]

 

[Rich V]

Shot an opossum in my yard last week, let the crows eat em.

[Intheswamp]

But, uh, rbinhood.  If you don't get the queen you're not adding any genetics to your beeyard...just feral bees that will die in several weeks.  You gotta get that queen... 

Best wishes,
Ed

PS, use a sassafras board for the possum...too much sap in the pine for my taste...it's getting harder to find sassafras boards big enough, though....

[beyondthesidewalks]

"Bee lining is something I want to try and do this yr."

Here's some info you might find helpful:

http://sites.google.com/site/beelining/

http://www.savethehives.com/fbp/Home.html

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/34044

[rbinhood]

But, uh, rbinhood.  If you don't get the queen you're not adding any genetics to your beeyard...just feral bees that will die in several weeks.  You gotta get that queen...  

Best wishes,
Ed

PS, use a sassafras board for the possum...too much sap in the pine for my taste...it's getting harder to find sassafras boards big enough, though....

I have had great success in the past getting the queen.....have to keep a close eye on them.....then at the right time install a special device in the cone and then check it everyday until she comes out.

Bye the way Ed that sassafras this as LA thang!

[buzzbee]

The queens genetics will also pass through the drone line.They come from unfertilized eggs.The drones may potentially mate with any supersedure or swarm queens in his yard.
 
 I think I saw eat the board coming!!

[BlueBee]

Y’all know more about trap outs than I do, but I was under the impression from reading iddee’s posts that catching the queen was rare?  Rbinhood can you describe this special device you use to catch the queen? 

After you got most of the foragers trapped out could you use something like a screened box or package box on the end of the trapout cone and end up with queeny + a few remaining bees trapped in there someday?

[PeeVee]

Still to try some serious bee lining. This is going to be the year.

I've got this old cookbook and I'm sure it mentions possum. Dang I was really looking forward to reading a new recipe

[Poppi]

I will only say this...  I'm a previous Coon hunter...  if you had seen the possum I saw and what he/she was coming out of....   there ain't no way to clean up a scavenger like that...   don't get me wrong...  I will pick up a possum by it's tail and not have a problem to release them somewhere else...   eat one...  there ain't no way to clean up the meat in a possum an make it edible...  there are some things man was not meant to eat...  possum is one of 'em.