About this episode
As bee populations fall, Sheila Dillon asks if some salvation may be found in the mean streets of our cities. With a report from New York where bee keeping was actually illegal for a long time but where the honey festival now thrives. In London a young brewer tells us how she combined her love of brewing and beekeeping to produce an award winning honey ale. In Copenhagen we hear from a project with hives across the city - each producing its own distinctive taste and flavour, determined by the source of the nectar. Even the offices are alive with the hum of bees as Dan Saladino hears how the venture enlists the help of homeless people and asylum seekers, giving them confidence and and training in all aspects of beekeeping, honey production and sales. Meanwhile in Bristol are trying to find out if urban habitats really can provide a stable environment for our bees to flourish - can our overlooked scruffy verges and car parks contribute to the solution to one of our biggest ecological threats? Produced by Sarah Langan.