Quantcast
Beekeeping earns buzz among New York’s rooftops – Metro US

Beekeeping earns buzz among New York’s rooftops

Guillermo Fernandez’s garden is ready, the hive set up. Now the New York marketing executive is just waiting for the arrival of 50,000 bees.

“It’s so soothing to see the connection between bees and flowers”, explains Fernandez. “And I wanted to do something for the bees. So much of our food depends on pollination, but one quarter of U.S. bees have died.”

Fernandez joins a growing number of New Yorkers who are becoming hobby beekeepers since the practice became legal in April.

His colony of 50,000 honeybees arrives on May 8.

Other large cities, too, are bustling with the sound of bees.

“Beekeeping is going through a renaissance”, notes Norman Carreck, Scientific Director of the International Bee Research Association. “People realize that without bees, we’d be without most of the interesting things we eat. And they’ve learned that it’s perfectly possible to keep bees in urban environments, including balconies and rooftops.”