Bee Liners
 
I returned last week from a two week beekeeping assignment in Bulgaria
and several of you have asked for an account of the trip.  Many of you
were kind enough to respond to various queries I posted from Bulgaria for
assistance, and for that I wish to thank you.
 
Bulgaria is located just north of Greece and east of Serbia, about 42
degrees north of the equator.  My job was to work with a large Bulgarian
beekeeper who wishes to expand his operation from 1600 hives to 5,000
hives.  He wants to convert from Dadant-Blatt hives to Langstroth hives.
Bulgarian beekeeping is impressive.  We never wore veils in any of the
bee yards we visited.  The bees were dark to black and very gentle.  The
beekeepers I met were very skilled.  The Dadant-Blatt hive has a deep
brood chamber and a single shallow super.  The brood frames are big and
bulky and hard to handle.  The beekeepers use plain wax foundation
reinforced with cross wires, and replace brood combs regularly.  Frames
are shop made and simple but sturdy.  Honey frames are removed from the
super as filled and extracted and replaced.  Labor is inexpensive.  They
uncap with forks and cold knives and use hand cranked extractors.  No
heat is used anywhere in honey processing and the honey quality is
superb.  The beekeeper I worked with packs and exports honey in 450 and
900 gram jars as well as hand thrown honey pots sealed with beeswax.  I
took samples of standard US commercial packs off the grocery store shelf
(Sue Bee, Dutch Gold, etc.), and my client's honey packs were superior.
He was surprised to learn how low our US honey quality standards are.  My
only explanation is that we use a lot of heat in processing and don't
control storage conditions too well so some of our quality parameters
suffer (like HMF).
 
Average yields in the areas I visited were 70 kilograms per hive per
year.  Primary honey sources were lindin and acacia, though there were a
lot of herbaceous plants in the mint family in bloom in August.  The
collective farm system has collasped and many farms have been abandoned.
Pesticides and fertilizers are difficult to obtain, all of which favors
bee forage.  I was particularly impressed with the skill of the
beekeepers, the gentleness of the bees, and the "fit" of the bees and
beekeepers with the environmnent.  Beekeeping just seemed natural in
Bulgaria, not a forced operation.
 
Varroa is controled with wooden strips dipped into a miticide they get
from Serbia, which no one wanted to talk about, but they claimed to have
Varroa under control.  EFB is not a problem, and they have some AFB and
use antibiotics.  We did see some heavy infestations of Braula coeca (bee
lice) in one bee yard.  The beekeepers were very concerned, as you could
see the lice on large numbers of adult bees.  I visited one bee school
where unemployed men were being taught beekeeping.  The teacher had a
yard of conical straw and dung skeps which were full of bees and honey
and doing very well.  The skeps were kept for demonstration purposes, but
also to generate swarms, which they preferred to making splits.
 
Bulgaria is a beautiful country with good food and friendly people, and
inexpensive I might add.  You need to learn to read Cyrilic if you go
however, as very little English is used.
 
Bill Lord
Louisburg, NC
 
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WILLIAM G LORD
E-Mail  : wglord@franklin
Internet: [log in to unmask]
Phone   : 9194963344