Urban beekeeping is becoming increasingly popular and it is estimated that there are already up to 5,000 beekeepers in the Greater London area. The urban landscape is now dotted with beehives. There is a rising awareness of the benefits of keeping bees, the importance of pollination and the effect it has on our own food. There is also the added bonus of being able to harvest locally sourced honey.
Ironically, in the city, there seems to be a bountiful supply of pesticide-free food for the bees to forage. Nowadays the countryside consists mainly of single season monoculture crops offering limited pollen and nectar for foraging bees to collect. The heat generated in a large city like London and the greater diversity of plants and flowers grown, mean that there’s almost always something in bloom all year round, and this gives the city bees an extended season with a constant variety of forage across the season.