IELTS — Reading

Urban beekeeping has surged in cities like London, Paris, and New York. Enthusiasts keep hives on rooftops and balconies, arguing that cities offer diverse flowers and fewer pesticides than farmland. Studies confirm that urban honeybees often produce more honey than rural ones. Critics, however, warn that too many hives compete with wild pollinators such as bumblebees and solitary bees, which are already declining. They recommend planting wildflowers and limiting hive numbers. City councils increasingly require beekeepers to register their hives so populations can be monitored. The popularity of rooftop hives has also changed the beekeeping itself. City colonies tend to build up quickly in warm months and then need feeding in late summer, when flowering gaps leave little nectar. Some beekeepers now keep smaller colonies, harvest less honey, and leave stores for winter, a reversal of the intensive practice that made urban honey famous. Councils, meanwhile, are mapping where hives already stand so that new ones are not added to districts already saturated.