A beekeeper in Leeds is installing hives on office rooftops, at an airport and a power station in an effort to boost dwindling pollinator numbers in the city. Tom Szpitter, who founded the company Band of Bees in 2022, argues that urban environments offer bees a more reliable source of forage and fewer pesticides than the countryside, where wildflower meadows and hedgerows have been lost. His work comes as conservationists warn that bee populations remain fragile despite a small recent recovery.

Hives have been placed at Leeds Bradford Airport, Enfinium Power Station in Castleford, Leeds Dock and, most recently, on the roof of City Square House, where staff can attend lunchtime workshops and take home honey harvested from the colonies. The Yorkshire Dales Millennium Trust found some bee species fell by 50% in 2024 to their lowest recorded levels. Another beekeeper, David Wagstaff of More Bees Please, said he had seen a "massive increase" in urban beekeeping, driven partly by pandemic-era demand for local produce and by councils and businesses planting more greenery, while the Bumblebee Conservation Trust described the decline in common bumblebee species over the past 20 years as "a real problem".