Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
Dec,  1893. 
Rose  Cultivation. 
603 
ROSE  CULTURE  IN  BULGARIA. 
From  the  World's  Fair  Circular  of  Shipkoff  &  Co.,  Kizanlik. 
The  culture  of  roses  in  Bulgaria  for  the  purpose  of  extracting  the 
Otto  of  Rose  is  not  only  the  oldest  and  most  attractive  industry  of 
the  country  but  also  quite  exclusively  our  own.  While  roses  are 
found  all  over  the  world  and  are  grown  everywhere  in  garden-beds, 
in  Bulgaria  they  are  grown  in  extensive  fields,  as  you  grow  here  the 
potato  or  the  vine.  This  industry,  however,  is  confined  only  to  one 
special  district  in  Bulgaria,  which  is  comprised  in  the  eight  counties 
above  mentioned,  with  Kizanlik  as  their  central  town,  called  in  con- 
sequence the  capital  of  the  rose  district.  The  rose  district  extends 
along  that  portion  of  the  southern  slopes  of  the  Balkan  Mountains, 
comprising  in  itself  the  whole  branch  range  of  the  Little  Balkans, 
which  shoots  out  of  the  main  Balkans  and  forms  one  of  its  chief 
arms.  The  average  length  of  the  rose  district  is  about  eighty  miles, 
and  its  average  width  is  about  thirty  miles.  Its  average  elevation 
is  about  1,300  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea.  The  average  height 
of  the  Balkans  along  the  rose  district  is  about  5,600  feet,  while  that 
of  the  Little  Balkans  is  about  3,700  feet. 
Attempts  have  often  been  made  to  grow  roses  all  over  Bulgaria 
but  they  all  have  proved  a  failure.  It  is  true  that  roses  have  been 
grown  and  are  grown  to  this  day  in  Persia,  India,  Egypt  and  China 
for  this  purpose,  but  they  hardly  produce  any  Otto  of  Rose.  They 
produce  almost  exclusively  rosewater,  and  it  is  chiefly  used  for  local 
consumption.  In  the  "Maritime  Alps"  of  Southern  France,  and 
especially  in  Cannes  and  Grasse  they  grow  quite  extensively  the 
"  Provence  rose  "  and  they  extract  from  it  a  peculiar  Otto  of  Rose, 
but  the  quantity  is  very  limited  and  they  chiefly  use  their  flowers  to 
make  pomades  and  rosewater.  In  Leipzig,  Germany,  they  also 
grow  the  roses  but  with  very  little  success.  Almost  in  all  the  other 
places  where  the  roses  are  grown,  they  lack  the  peculiar  advantages 
of  climate  that  we  possess,  and  have  in  consequence  to  use  twice 
and  even  thrice  the  quantity  of  flowers  to  make  the  same  amount 
of  Otto.  The  hottest  weather  we  ever  experience  in  summer  is  88° 
F.  and  the  coldest  of  winter  is  rarely  under  150  F.  above  zero. 
Then,  during  the  harvest  and  the  distillation  season,  which  is  in  the 
latter  part  of  May  and  the  first  part  of  June,  we  have  regular 
showers  of  rain,  and  in  the  mornings  heavy  falls  of  dew — both 
absolutely  necessary  for  the  Otto  of  Rose  distillation. 
