Urban beekeeping gets nod from Edmonton council

When Mike Hamilton and Jocelyn Crockerapproached their neighbours with their plan last summer, they knew it wasn't going to be easy.

"That was a difficult conversation to have," he said.

The couplewanted to house bees in their backyard, hundreds and hundreds of bees.

The challenge wasto convince their neighboursthat bees were not the pests that make patio life difficult during Edmonton summers, crawling into sugary drinks,dive-bombing grilled meat and daring anybody to do anything about it.

"The pests you find bothering you in the summertime are usually the yellow jackets or paper wasps," he said.

"Honeybees are interested in nectar, pollen and that's about it," Hamilton said. "Unless you're carrying a bunch of flowers around and you happen to walk into an apiary, then you're pretty safe."

This is the second summerHamiltonand Crockerhave tended bees at their Capilano-area home.

The family wanted to improve the yield of their fruit trees. A family friend was anurban beekeeper and they decided to join him.

First, they approached the city

"The city, in the end, was very receptive to it," Hamilton said. "They were ready for that conversation. Urban agriculture is a hot topic right now."

The city, in fact, was running a project test piloting urban beekeeping andHamilton and Crockersigned on.

Today the gave the go aheadto prospective beekeepers around the city.

As for Hamilton's neighbours?

"We ended up developing stronger bonds with our neighbours," Hamilton said. "It was something interesting, they wanted to come see it and we got talking about it.

"And now when we see them, they say, 'Hey! How are your bees? How's it going?' And we can share the product of that which is the other benefit."