Mineclonia Minetest with Bees and Wine Mod

 There is a lot to poke around with on this combination - and not all of it actually works.  That makes me wonder more, and keep trying things.  This is writing down some of the things that made me scratch my head to figure them out. 

 I had found out how to make cider, sparkling cider, wheat beer, barley beer, rum and coffee liquer.  I had not yet figured out how to get honey, or how to make it into mead.  I also have, for all it being named 'wine' not found grapes yet anywhere in the world - but I'd like to, and try that out.  It says there is corn, too - and tomatoes, haven't found either of those yet, either.  I've got a little pillager problem on both sides North and South of me in this map but have been cautiously expanding my territory East and West - and now I'm edging North again at one spot to see if I can make it across the sea.  Monsters are on, so I'm having to make safe places and carry enough materials to quickly make a basic house.

A bigger, fancier house - I wouldn't do those stairstep roof quite like that again - it was difficult - and with the 'get comfortable' mod on, it makes it even more difficult to make the stairstep roofs that I do like, like in the below picture.  But, not impossible.  I have just had to use a lot of dirt scaffolding and then break it back out from the inside.

 One of the biggest problems with this combination and survival is that there are two of many things, sugars - one from sugarcane and one from stevia, different flours and uses of wheat, not all that work quite like they should and do in the Asuna mods .. and there are also two honeycombs.  One honeycomb is gotten by shearing a hive (smoke it first and you won't get hit damage, otherwise, take the hit damage) and the other is gotten by catching three bees in a jar and putting them together in a small 'r' formation on the crafting grid.  Both of those make hives by putting three honeycombs across in the center and planks above and below - but they make DIFFERENT hives.

 The hive on the left is made with the hive shearing method.  This is also the type of honeycomb you get out of shearing wild hives.  The hive on the right is made by putting three honeycombs from the 'bee in a jar' method.  And then you have to catch more bees in jars to put them into that hive.  Bee in a jar does not work in the left hive... but it still makes more honey and acts just like a wild hive.

Now, when it comes to making something out of the honeycombs besides hives - you can use the wild type honeycomb in a crafting grid with a piece of string above it to make a candle.  And then you can set the candle somewhere and light it with a flint and steel.  It also makes honeycomb blocks with foursquare, but they are just a building material. I'd really like to see that be more useful, and possibly the honeycomb itself be a foodstuff.

As far as I've seen you can't use either honeycomb as sugar, and neither can be eaten. 

Only the wild bee type honeycomb shows up in your inventory when you are in the fermenting barrel mode from the wine, but I haven't found a recipe with it yet to make mead.  However, the hive on the right (the one from the honeycomb gotten from bee jars) when full can be emptied with a glass bottle, to get a bottle of honey.  That bottled honey can be placed in the below recipe of one drinking glass and one bottle of honey to make honey-mead in the fermenting barrel!  It seemed like it took forever to get that to work out!

honey mead recipe in luanti mineclonia minetest

coffee liquer / liquor recipe in luanti mineclonia minetest

make the glass of rum (bottom left corner) by fermenting sugarcane in the top right and bottom left corners with the empty drinking glasses, and then ferment the rum with the coffee beans

Also discovered : You can dry kelp in the furnace and it becomes a food source. 

I have the 'plant based foods' mod as well - and for some silly reason it does not let the soybeans from the farming redo be made into plant milk - but it will let rice (not the one that grows on silt, but the one obtained from punching grass for random seeds) be made into plant milk.  You place the water filled bucket in the top left corner of the crafting table, and then fill all but the bottom two right squares with uncooked rice.  It turns into a bucket of plant milk.  You can then place the bucket of plant milk in the furnace and it becomes tofu.  But why aren't the soybeans worked into this, since that is the actual way you make tofu?  Make that make sense!  But the tofu can be eaten.  In these mods also cow's milk in a bucket can be put in the furnace to make edible mozzarella cheese.  All of those are correct in giving you back your empty iron bucket.  BUT - beware of the ice cream recipe, because it takes a bucket of milk but does not give you your bucket back.  That's expensive ice cream!

 

More garden pictures

Morning glories this morning
truly glorious


Kentucky wonder that has attached itself to the sprinkler


Shackamaxon bean pods

Was out in the garden again to check on what was forming yesterday and got pictures of the Shackamaxon bean starting to put on tiny pods from the pretty purple flowers yesterday.


Shackamaxon pole bean pods


Whippoorwill cowpeas with a purple flower



An elusive bee. They are there, just in small numbers and very quick moving


Large sticky hard bodied ants
seem to also be gathering on some of the cowpeas. These are black eyed peas.
I think they are gathering the same nectar the wasps are after,
and are very protective against other insects trying to eat the plant.


The experiment bean, severely bugged
but good to capture the plant leaves.

These seem very 'bugged', and for the record, have no wasps or ants on them. There was a fuzzy bumblebee coming by on this and the pinto plant next to it to visit the flowers. There is definitely some politics going on out there - and this one is losing out on the protection from the aggressive insects because it has no nectar buds outside the flowers.


The experiment 'Esme'
I'm thinking more and more this is of the 'vermont cranberry' type

notes

morning glories

Esme has been clean and dry for three days and two nights. That is no small feat. She has finally clicked with it. Last night and the night before she refused the diaper for bedtime, mostly because that MEANT bedtime, but she didn't wet the bed, either. I know it isn't 100%... won't tell myself it is, yet... but woohoo :)

Tiny notes on the garden. I would like to position the beans between the zucchini and pumpkins next year - so they get more bees. The bees LOVE the squash flowers with all their pollen and the beans are probably getting some 'love' but not as much. Keeping the zucchini and pumpkins further apart will help with that cross-pollination thing I learned about the other day. I did not know that zucchinis and pumpkins were still close enough to crossbreed, like dogs and wolves. They are! Since I am saving pumpkin seeds I don't want to end up with a squashkin .. or do I? I'd have to meet a squashkin to find out. Pumpkins ARE squash... so... Also, I saw the wasps going from flower to flower in the purple hulled peas, which the bees seem to be leaving largely alone. Those cowpeas are producing pods while the black eyed peas (also cowpeas, and planted earlier) are doing very little. I am wondering if the wasps are pollinating the purple hulled peas just enough (bees are better at it, according to the articles I've read) to help or if they are keeping the bees from coming near those plants out of territorialism? I've read some articles and forum posts about cowpeas secreting sweet nectars to attract wasps, in order to protect themselves from being eaten by certain other bugs that would be present if the wasps were not nearby.


Jarrahdale blue pumpkin

I am awaiting the Jarrahdale to see how it tastes. The stem on it is not hard, yet... so it stays out there. There is another baby pumpkin started, and one more small grapefruit sized one turning orange. I finally have a Butternut squash started - hoping it grows to maturity. I think the extra butternuts in the valley which are flowering, but not doing much else, have helped to pollinate the one that is in the garden. Butternuts and pumpkins/zucchini do not cross, and may need more of their own kind to pollinate well. I've been cracking and eating the seeds out of the big pumpkin and they have been wonderful. I'd like to try the Kakai or Lady Godiva breed of pumpkin next year as the seeds do not have that woody hull around them. I am geeking out a bit on this stuff.. because I can. I even ordered a used pumpkin cookbook from Alibris!


a morning Pollywog

Garden and bee pictures

a pretty formation of squash leaves


a happy bee


The same happy bee, busy at his work

I've been out in the garden again for the morning. There is a massive hum out there, while the bees take their fill of the pollen in the squash flowers. I cut out two vines from the Connecticut Field pumpkins and threw them in the woods -- they were starting to wander where they were not wanted... the bees didn't like that much but didn't complain too heavily about it, either. Now it is just about 10 am and too hot to really be out there. Esme is playing in a mud puddle in the shade.. so I am letting her. If she was running around in the sun I would try to find another way to entertain her.

I planted the long radishes and the English daisy seeds. I put two black-eyed pea seeds (standard grocery store dry goods, I didn't buy them as seed) at the base of each of the row marker poles in the corn... if they grow it will be nice. If they do not grow, the rest still served their purpose as lunch. Also there was a poisonous hyacinth bean plant that a friend at work gave me... and I'm a little scared of. It gives large purple half-moon beans that can only be eaten when they are very small... and after that are poisonous. I put it in the corner of the fenced-in garden on it's own stake.

We have marigolds all over the garden, scattered at will from very cheap seed packets from our country store (15-20 cents each). When they bloom it will be gorgeous out there. The blooms on the beans and squash are very pretty in their own right. I caught some pictures of the bees inside the flowers.


Above is the portion of the garden that is NOT squash, corn, or beans. Tomatoes, peppers, a few flowers, marigolds, cucumbers, sunflowers and well.. okay there is some ornamental corn, gourds and (not sprouted) scarlet runner beans in the very back. So, yes there is some corn squash and beans here *ha*.


white flowers on the pinto bean plant


purple flowers on the provider green snap bean

Now I am off to get my simmering black eyed peas (with green beans and radishes) off the stove and see what can be done with the mixture. Esme is still running around outside. If she is good and gets cleaned up maybe I'll take her to the library?

Estimation: According to the online calendar, the black eyed peas would be maturing in the first week of August and/or up until the last week of September. (70-110 days from June 6, 2011) Because they are from the grocery and not an actual seed source, they may not flower and produce at all. I am guessing (because it does not say anywhere) the Shackamaxon pole beans are also about 100 days to drying time... which means I need to plant them soon instead of waiting until July.

April 14th was when we planted the pintos, green beans and Connecticut Field pumpkins (110 days). They should also come due sometime in mid-August. The turk's turbans (95d) and blue jarrahdale pumpkins (100d) were planted one and two weeks after the Connecticut Field pumpkins, respectively, and The very first green beans were on the 2nd of June. The first zucchini (2 inches long) was on the 4th of June. The carrots are not quite ready today.

Still on the list to plant: Calendula, Shackamaxon pole beans, more carrots?, experiment beans (brown and red with speckles from the dry soup mix).