Nomadic beekeepers
(baonghean.vn) -Wherever there are beautiful flowers in bloom, they bring their bees there. When the flowers are in bloom, the bees can freely collect nectar. When the season is over, they follow the trail to find the flowers and bring the bees to new lands.
By chance, during a business trip to the sandy and windy land of Dien Chau, weaving through the sesame fields, we came across large bee farms under the rustling pine trees, arranged and set up quite neatly and meticulously... Through research, we learned that these bee farms are nomadic across regions.
In Dien Chau district (Nghe An), every year (in July), there are 10-15 mobile bee farms from all over the country coming to collect sesame pollen. But this year, the number of these mobile bee colonies has reached over 30 farms, they are present in some communes which are the largest sesame granaries in the district such as Dien Thanh, Dien An, Dien Trung, Dien Van...
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The largest group is still from Hung Yen and Ha Nam provinces, in Nghe An province from Nghia Dan district, in the south from Binh Thuan, Dong Nai and Lam Dong provinces also bring bees here. Now is the season of raising and preparing for the honey season in the last months of the year. At the end of the sixth lunar month, when the sesame flower season ends, the bees follow the trucks to new lands.
For those who come from far away provinces, their bee colonies have from 250 to nearly 400 hives. In Dien Chau sesame field, there are currently over 30 bee farms from all over the region being nurtured waiting for the upcoming flower season.
This season, Dien Chau sesame plants grow strongly, sesame plants have a lot of pollen, which is a favorable condition for queen bees to reproduce. At the end of this lunar month, beekeepers here will put them on trucks, take them to the South or to some other districts of Nghe An province such as Nghia Dan, Thanh Chuong, Do Luong... to welcome the main honey season from November to May of the solar calendar.
Mr. Tran Van Dung, a veteran beekeeper in Le Chau village, Hong Lam commune (Tien Lu district, Hung Yen province) said that with a 12-month/year cycle, the bee farm has over 350 hives, present from Ha Tay, Ha Nam to Nghe An to the Central Highlands, Dong Nai... Most of them are present in all provinces.
On a large area of land in the lau forest, Mr. Tran Van Uy's bee colony (Duy Tien district, Ha Nam province) has 300 hives and is preparing to leave for Nghia Dan. Nguyen Tai's bee colony (Tan Loc, Dong Nai) has nearly 300 hives and is about to return to the South. These nomadic beekeepers are very simple, just a small camp, a prefabricated bed and cooking utensils. The tools for bee care are cans of water for drinking and sugar as extra food for the bees during the scarce season.
Following the flower seasons, taking care of bees has many risks, making beekeepers more worried. The weather changes erratically, bees are susceptible to disease. Pollen does not have enough nutrients, bee colonies cannot develop. Then other insects attack... beekeepers are like sitting on fire. Remembering last month when he brought bees to Tan Ky district, Mr. Dung was worried when the swarm of bees there attacked his bee colony. Bees are the most dangerous enemies of honeybees, they wait outside the doors of the furthest nests, bite worker bees to death, then crawl in to destroy and eat all the young larvae. Therefore, beekeepers must always have a badminton racket ready, whenever they see bees as big as a finger buzzing around, it is definitely a bee colony. Less than a month in Tan Ky, Mr. Dung quickly brought his bee colony to Dien Chau to recover.
Following the bee colony, each year they have to wander through many lands, in Hoa Binh waiting to collect acacia honey, then go to Quang Ninh to the mangrove forest area, to Bac Giang, Hung Yen to welcome the longan and lychee season; to Thai Binh to find the mangrove and jute growing areas, down to Nghe An to find areas with lots of sesame, crab apple trees, and eucalyptus. At the end of July, they will go south, up to the Central Highlands, down to Binh Thuan, Phu Yen right when the coffee trees are in full bloom. The owners of this bee colony were also beekeepers in the past, after decades of rolling around all the forests to acquire a bee colony like this.
Beekeepers never have a decent place to live, Mr. Uy said: “Having a house is like not having one, having a wife is like not having one, living in deserted, remote places… Many nights I dare not sleep because I am afraid of ghosts…!”. Among the forests I have been to, the Central Highlands forest is the place that impresses beekeepers the most. Not only are the bees full, but the beekeepers only have to get tired when collecting honey, and otherwise do not have to worry about food for the bees.
Nowadays, the forests in the North are getting narrower and narrower, and the pollen areas are also much less. A few years ago, Dien Chau sesame field had only a dozen bee colonies, but this year there are up to 30 bee colonies stationed here. Although it was earlier than last year, because of the large number of colonies, the flowers here were almost withered, so the brothers had to arrange to leave early.
Mr. Dung has been following the bees for 3 years, confided: "Over time, it has become a habit, beekeepers like us often consider bees as our friends. Going to many forest areas and flower areas is also fun, it somewhat compensates for the emptiness of this job of finding flowers."
At this time, Dien Chau is almost at the end of the sesame flower season, and the bee farms here are looking for flower seasons in other lands. The symbiotic life between bees and flowers is promising a golden season of sesame and honey.
Nguyen Phe -Dan Tri Newspaper
