Top Bar Beekeeping

Top bar hives, known as “transitional hives” in Africa, are bee hives without the full frames used in modern hives to hold honeycombs. Bees attach combs to simple pieces of wood called “top bars.” Hives employing top bars are considered to be transitional because they are an intermediate step between traditional hives and modern hives. Traditional hives are woven baskets built in designs passed down from one generation of beekeepers to the next. In Ethiopia, traditional hives are long cane cylinders, which are mounted high in trees. In other parts of the world, traditional hives may be skeps, round overturned baskets. The inexpensive traditional hives, constructed of locally abundant plant materials, are easily built by people skilled in basket weaving. However, traditional bee hives present some disadvantages for the beekeeper. They offer no way to remove and replace honeycombs, to manipulate the hive, or to inspect for hive problems or brood diseases. Transitional hives, built from locally available materials, are also inexpensive. They offer the beekeeper several advantages. Located on the ground, they are safer to work with than those mounted high in trees. Transitional hives do not have heavy parts, such as hive bodies and honey supers, to be lifted. They can, thus, be worked by those of lesser strength. Honey is usually harvested from top bar hives by hand-crushing the honeycomb and straining to separate the beeswax from the honey, saving the cost of a honey extractor. These advantages make top bar hives attractive to some individuals in developed countries.

I am assisting beekeeper and pottery artist Melissa Bridgman start a colony of honey bees in a top bar hive. To guide the bees’ comb construction, we painted the center of the top bars with chemical-free beeswax. A swarm of bees built combs on the top bars, temporarily attached to Langstroth top bars. The well-fed swarm readily accepted the top bars, built out comb, and produced brood. These top bars will be transferred to Melissa’s top bar hive.

--Richard

Nazareth to Addis Ababa

We returned to Addis Ababa to check on the lines of yeast being propagated under laboratory conditions. The yeast will be used in the production of Ethiopia’s distinct honey mead, known as tej. Those who participated in the project to produce the honey mead proclaim it is their goal to bring tej to a level of prestige. Once reserved for the elite, tej is now enjoyed by many. This trip to Ethiopia has been quite an experience. I met many people interested in our projects centered in Bonga, Ethiopia in the highland organic honey region. A food scientist discussed organic crops and the role of honey bees in pollination and food production. Several Ethiopians shared passed-down knowledge of tej making. Abraham Tesfaye explained the microbiology of yeast propagation. Hafez Anwar explained how foreign countries are helping build Ethiopia’s infrastructure with large projects like his road construction. I asked, “How can Ethiopia progress to a six-lane superhighway carrying trucks to Djibouti’s sea port when the road cuts through pedestrian neighborhoods blocking foot traffic and even livestock herding?” Students and businessmen listened intently to details of the bee hive projects I assisted Apinec develop. I spent hours with my host Wubishet Adugna, often over bereles of tej, sharing thoughts on beekeeping and ways to provide opportunities for the Ethiopian people by harvesting the honey bees’ products derived from the diverse forest bounty. I got an opportunity to share wonderful food, music, and other riches of Ethiopian life. I saw resourceful people who never complained no matter how adverse the situation. They were always helpful, friendly, and eager to laugh with me. I had a most memorable visit to Ethiopia.

On the road we pass more livestock including cattle with high upturned horns. From Addis Ababa a long air flight will return me to Proctor, Arkansas and waiting family. Much bee yard work waits as well. Unlike tropical Ethiopia, the temperate United States experiences seasonal changes. My bees are visiting spring flowers

--Richard

The Great Rift Valley

We entered the Great Rift Valley near Nazareth. This massive depression dividing the Ethiopian highland regions is the location where many of our human ancestors’ fossilized remains are being found. It appears likely that this area of eastern Africa is the origin of humans and our predecessors. I had the privilege of viewing many of the fossil findings at the National Museum in Addis Ababa including the over-three-million-year-old Australopithecus called “Lucy.”

While the climate of the Ethiopian highlands is moderated by their altitude, the low elevation and proximity to the equator makes this rift area quite hot and dry. The Rift, eastern Ethiopia, and much of the Horn of Africa is now in its third year of severe drought which coincides with a particularly strong La Nina event described as a cooling of the surface waters of the central and eastern Pacific Ocean. While some individuals in parts of the world deny the existence of global warming or climate change, those who live in the Great Rift Valley understand climate destabilization. Pastoralists of eastern Ethiopia and the Great Rift Valley see their livestock stressed by dried-up pasture grasses. Herdsmen carry their livestock great distances to rivers for water. Projections are for continued drought in this arid region as well as in Ethiopia’s poorest area, the Southern Nations, Nationalities, and People’s Region. Worldwide, climate destabilization moves the weather toward the extremes. An English language article in Addis Ababa’s Daily Monitor datelined Nairobi, Kenya outlines proposals for correcting the effect of human-generated greenhouse gasses such as water vapor, carbon dioxide, and methane released by the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas. Technologies used around the world to alleviate greenhouse gasses are classified as Carbon Dioxide Removal and Solar Radiation Management. Reforestation and avoidance of deforestation help by absorbing carbon dioxide. Large portions of Ethiopia’s forests have been cleared for farmland. Climate disturbance tends to affect those already experiencing the harshest of conditions. Today’s photo: dromedary camels in Ethiopia’s Great Rift Valley.

--Richard

Social Courts and Social Bonds

Ten neatly dressed women sitting in the shade of a spreading ficus tree appear to be conducting an important meeting. My Ethiopian contact explains that I am witnessing a Social Court, a structure that exists in rural Ethiopia where a police or governmental presence is rarely seen. Community leaders convene a Social Court to settle domestic disputes or community complaints. A person found guilty by his community may be fined, forced to perform work, or shunned, a harsh penalty in a close-knit interdependent community. Social Courts are an effective control over the behavior of rural citizens. They hold the community together and give offenders a real understanding of the group’s expectations.

Examples of social bonding abound in Ethiopia. A strong example is the Ethiopian tradition of family, friends, and invited guests sharing the same food from a common serving—and eating by hand. The meal of meat or vegetables is placed on a thin sheet of fermented bread, known as injera. Those sharing the meal tear off pieces of injera to scoop up bites of food. Social customs in Ethiopia build bonds between friends as well as between those meeting for the first time. Ethiopians always stand, shake hands, and acknowledge everyone in the room. However, if a person is sick or his hands are not clean, he offers the wrist as a handshake. In the Ethiopian countryside, one sees the close bond that Ethiopians have with their animals. When young boys herd the family’s animals, they mind their owners like well-trained dogs. Beasts of burden carry bundles of goods along roads ahead of their owners who follow on foot. Animals and people sleep together inside small huts for protection from predators. Quite a few Ethiopian families maintain a bond with their honey bees, mounting their hives under the low-hanging thatch roofs of the family’s hut. Children play among the flying honey bees. People, livestock, and honey bees live in close proximity. Wubishet Adugna and I share bereles of tej.

--Richard

Teff for Injera

As we traveled northward, the forests thinned and farms abounded in Ethiopia’s open plains. As we left the forests, we encountered less monkeys and baboons on the road, but larger herds of livestock. Our truck stopped repeatedly for cattle being driven to water in the rivers. Crossing the Omo River gorge, we encountered numerous volcanoes. Today’s photo shows a typical farm with a thatched roof, stick and mud daub house located near the base of a volcano. The entire family shares the single-room house with cattle, sheep, goats, and donkeys. Young boys direct the cattle herd’s movements with a stick like a conductor directing an orchestra. The cattle obey their master with whom they live night and day. Stacks of teff recently harvested by hand with a short sickle sit on the ground. Family members, including children, toss the teff into the air to separate the fine seed. Teff is the staple crop used to make the fermented bread known as injera that is eaten at every meal.

As we continued on our drive to Nazareth, Wubishet and I discussed how Ethiopia’s honey bees tend to abscond, or abandon their hives, much more frequently than do the honey bees of beekeepers in the more temperate climate of the United States. Wubishet described seasonal management of the hives in which beekeepers increase the volume of the hives prior to major nectar flows to accommodate the colonies’ honey storage capacity. I explained that some believe that tropical bees, like those in Ethiopia, don’t hoard honey, but instead abscond and move to the mountains during the dry season. Wubishet said that that description of tropical bee behavior is not correct. I told him that honey bees will abscond if their hive becomes completely undesirable. He explained that at times the comb melts in the equatorial heat, truly making for an unfit nest. We stopped at Walesa for a meal of traditional fasting food: injera with an assortment of beans, peas, lentils, and peppers.

--Richard

Jimma to Nazareth

Wubishet and I brought an empty drum from Bonga to the fuel depot at Jimma, but Jimma was experiencing a shortage of fuel. An angry encounter at the fuel depot was the only time I heard voices raised my entire time in Ethiopia. Many trucks converged on the fuel depot, and the operators would not pump any extra fuel. They did, however, allow us to fill our truck’s fuel tank with diesel. A guard with an automatic rifle ensured no actions exceeded the raising of voices. After a final cup of Jimma’s famous Kaffa Zone forest coffee, we started the long and beautiful drive to Nazareth.

Wubishet Adugna, an accomplished beekeeper and businessman, taught beekeeping skills to 2000 farmers who supply honey and beeswax to Apinec. As we made the long trip by truck from Jimma to Nazareth, we discussed honey bee health and compared beekeeping techniques between Ethiopia and the United States. In the Kaffa Zone, we encountered many traditional bee hives hanging high in trees I spotted a dark mass 50 feet up a tree and adjacent to traditional bee hives. I asked Wubishet if that might be exposed honeycomb or a swarm. He explained that it was a colony of small ants, locally called “enni.” These ants fight larger ants living in the ground, and ants are considered Ethiopia’s greatest honey bee pest. Ethiopia doesn’t have Varroa mites, America’s most deadly pest. Ethiopia doesn’t allow the importation of bees or items which might bring in Varroa. Ethiopia has lesser trade in shipping containers and no sea harbors. Discussing bees, Wubishet explained that he resents the image presented of African “killer bees.” We visited a farm house with traditional bee hives attached to the walls under the thatched roof eaves. Children regularly played around the hives. We saw honey bees and humans living together in harmony. The photo shows the stick and mud daub construction of a typical Ethiopian farm house protecting humans and domestic animals from predators.

--Richard

Bonga to Jimma

I said good bye to the students at Apinec. In the few days that I was with them I shared information about producing products from the bee hive, and together we created a procedure for making tej, the Ethiopian honey mead. I also answered quite a few questions about America. There were numerous questions about “red-skinned” American Indians and American family customs, especially the role of females in our society. Many wanted to know about the prospects for the reelection of President Barak Obama. The citizens of remote Bonga, Ethiopia were versed in American political issues at great depth and understanding. The men each gave me a warm Ethiopian handshake, shoulder bump, and hug. They were all amused when I gave the one female in the group an American hug. Wubishet Adugna and I headed for Jimma by truck.

As we travelled the dusty road through the Kaffa Zone, we observed numerous traditional hives hanging high in trees. The hives are a beautiful sight on the Ethiopian highland ridges adorning tall Cordia africana trees, “weyra” in Amharic. We stopped at the home of beekeeper Abeba Rausha who showed me the bees he keeps in modern bee hives, modified Zander hives. Most modern bee hives in Ethiopia are painted yellow. Forest coffee beans dried in the sun on the ground in front of Abeba’s bee hives. Abeba served us fresh bread that his wife had baked along with valonia honey and coffee. This was indeed a delicious and memorable meal shared on the porch of Abeba’s home. Abeba manages 175 bee hives with some modern hives and many traditional hives. White blossoms of valonia, a low tree of 20 to 30 feet covered the southwestern Ethiopia highlands. The Kaffa Zone is the heart of the organic forest honey and coffee region. The word “coffee” comes from Kaffa. The coffee tree is thought to have been discovered here and taken from the Kaffa zone to be replanted in equatorial regions around the world.

--Richard