Bricks and nectar

Not many beekeepers ferry so many black bin liners in and out of their tower block that the local council suspect them of running a crack den (the same council who have missed the real crack den in the basement). Not many beekeepers transport their hives in a decommissioned London taxi, narrowly avoiding disaster when a would-be passenger tries to get in. Not many beekeepers end up having to coax their swarming bees into a cardboard box on Oxford Street, surrounded by people taking pictures and asking if they sting. Not many beekeepers, in other words, keep bees in London.

Or rather, they do. The increasing popularity of the hobby in the capital has prompted Steve Benbow to produce The Urban Beekeeper, an informative and often touching book. Aimed at those considering a life with the hives, it nonetheless gives the rest of us an entertaining portrait of a typical apiarist’s year, and of how urban honey production differs from that in the countryside.

Benbow has done both, which is why he’s immune to the ‘Trendy Towny’ charge. Schooled in beekeeping by his grand-parents during a Shropshire childhood, he dislikes the terminally-hip Borough Market, shuns designer equipment and is more than aware that London’s growing bee population could threaten its supply of nectar. Though he points out that with 42 per cent of the city being open space, and a further 24 per cent private gardens, the answer is surely more flowers rather than fewer bees.

The facts about these humble little creatures are enthralling. An average hiveful flies the distance to the moon and back each year, though when you move them it has to be either more than three miles or less than three feet; anything in between confuses them.