You Won't Believe What I Found On A City Centre Rooftop!?

Nestled behind Deansgate in Manchester city center, there is a tiny little entrance with Klimat above the door. You press the buzzer, you walk through the corridor, up a lift into the 8th floor, and it opens up into the most amazing sun-filled room, which is the Klimat restaurant. I've walked all the way through the restaurant. The guys are at work, they're chopping meat, making pork chops, getting ready for the lunchtime session. And I have just been outside doing a little bit of filming with the drone and and getting myself ready to get strapped on to go and see the bees. Now, this is not a straightforward apiary. There's harnesses involved, there's straps, there is serious danger on this apiary. We're 8 stories up in the middle of Manchester, and there are 4 colonies up here taking advantage of the multiple amounts of forage in Manchester. I can see it from up here. I can see bushes, I can see shrubs, I can see weeds, I can see balsam. The bees have filled a lot of the supers here. I'm with Chris Laidler today, the owner of Climaat. He also owns a very nice restaurant in Chester as well to extract some honey from these bees. We are gonna cause some carnage on the roof of Klima today, blowing out bees. This is a video not to be missed. So Chris Laidler, owner of Klima. You've kept bees up here for a couple of years, Chris. Thank you for the invite. Tell me about your bees.

So yeah, this is our second full season just drawing to a close. We had a terrible first year. Last year was a really poor year, but the hives were establishing themselves, so we weren't really expecting much in the way of a harvest. Towards the end of the summer, the balsams really kicked in and the bees have been working that hard, so we're just Just about to take the last of the harvest off and hoping for about 240 kilos I reckon in total this year. Nice.

Let's get the smoker lit and let's get started, Chris.

Let's go.

So a bit of cardboard to get it started and then you are a fan of hessian?

Yes, we use the coffee sacks which we started using this season. They weren't too expensive, it goes a long way, blows nice cool smoke, lights easy and stays lit. So much better than the cardboard roll-ups that we used last season. They are great for about 5 minutes and seem to burn out.

Chris said to me, make sure whatever you do, don't stand on this loose bit of decking up here. And every single time I've walked past it so far, I've trod on the bit of decking. So sorry, Chris, it's gonna— I think it's gonna be broken by the end of the day. I'll just kind of like show you the bit here. It's just like a loose bit of decking. Where is it? Which one is it?

It's that one there. So it's, uh, there's nothing on it.

I've basically done it again as he said it. There we go. Sorry. So I've got to try and avoid that.

I might leave it. I might put the bucket there just to, um, That's a good idea.

My only concern with that though is that if we fall off, we are kind of like fully harnessed on here, but you know, there's not kind of much in the way between me and the bottom down there. So Chris said if you fall, just try and hang on to that ledge down there, but I'm staying on the harness I think because it's a little bit scary. So you're on Langstroth setup. Tell me about why you're on Langstroth.

Well, I started using Flow Hives I wasn't a huge fan. I think for the Manchester weather, it's probably not quite substantial enough. So seeing as we had already got started with the Langstroth dimension, we decided to stick with that style. And we've got these fairly substantial, a lot more substantial cedar hives.

So pretty chilled out bees. They've all gone down. That's good. That's a nice trait of some bees to go down like that.

This hive is lovely.

Right, so let's get inside the hives and see if there's any honey. Fingers crossed. Hive number 1.

So I've left this a little bit late. 2 weeks ago, this outer frame was quite full and the bees have, with all the weather we've had recently, decided to tuck into that. And it feels like a similar story with this. Oh, maybe not. There's a bit of capped honey there.

I'd be happy with that. That's a very nice frame of honey. Look at that.

That'll do.

Beautiful white cappings as well. So what do you think they're foraging on up here?

This time of the year, I think balsam. It's prolific in Manchester. It loves building sites, rivers, canals. Manchester's got all of those in abundance. Maybe some ivy, that seems to carpet some of the riverbanks.

So frame number 1, as Chris said, not much on it, but every other single frame in that first box is full, full to the brim with honey. Now there's a few bees on this frame here, but I couldn't resist it. Like, the first time in Manchester doing bee work, gotta have a taste of the local forage. And look at that, just kind of dripping straight out. Nice thin honey. That is one of the nicest honeys I have ever tasted. And of course I'm going to say that, innit, because I say it to everyone.

I think you've been flying.

That genuinely is one of the nicest honeys I think I've ever tasted. It's so like, um, it's like sweet. I know honey is sweet. That is absolutely delicious. I love taking like the outside frame, you know, the one that's not properly capped over and it's like a bit loose and it's a bit nectary. Like you put that in a jar, it's just going to ferment. I have chosen, I've not chosen like a prime A prime frame that Chris is going to extract. Oh, little bee checking me out there. A very, very light honey, very floral, lots and lots of different flavours, which is indicative of what you would get in a city centre. You're not going to get 1,000 lime trees and you're not going to get tonnes and tonnes of bramble. What you're going to get is a little bit of this, a little bit of that, loads of different flavours inside the honey. Now it's the middle of September at the moment, so I shouldn't really keep this frame out. We're going to incite some crazy amounts of robbing. Let's get back and see how much honey is left in that beehive. Right, so what's the plan, Chris?

So we've got 3 supers left on this one. We're going to take them off one by one, make a neat little pile there, get the roof back on, use the blower to get maybe 90% of the bees out, and we'll do the finishing touches down there.

So look at that, these are pretty chilled out bees. I'd be very, very happy with these if I were you. How many supers did you say you got off this one this year?

Uh, 3 today, so that'll make it 8.

8 supers in Manchester city centre, and like, these are big Langstroth supers, so you're talking upwards of £30 on each one. 8 times 30, 240 pounds. And I always calculate it by the little jars that I use, so 480 jars from a single beehive in the centre of Manchester. That's really, really good, Chris. Should we get inside? I really want to see your queen, see what the queen's like, and see what the brood pattern is, because I think this is a cracking colony of bees.

Let's go for it.

So utilising a frame rest there, I like that. It's a good idea, a frame rest, isn't it?

You don't get much room to manoeuvre out up here, so Any little gadget that can help out with that is, uh, yeah.

Do you mark your queens?

Uh, this one's pink.

Oh, nice.

I've not had to remark her because she came with one of those lovely little tabs on. In fact, there's not much brood at all.

No, well, they've all emerged and they're just getting ready for winter now, aren't they? Perfect time to get your treatments on though, once you've got your honey off. What are you using this year?

This winter we're using Apivar strips. Um, really easy, quite good at low temperatures, so I've probably left it a little bit later than some beekeepers, but I don't need to worry about that. Last year we Pulled them out mid-November, end of November, and all colonies pulled through the winter. Had really low varroa levels throughout this season, so going to follow a similar recipe. Always hiding on one of the last frames, this queen.

Always. So couldn't find the queen in that colony, but lots of brood, lots of eggs, so we know the queen is there. It is September, it's robbing season in the UK, so you don't want to keep your hives open for too long. We're going to close that one back up now and get on to the really important bit today. We're going to blow out some Oh, 1227.

There we go.

Yeah, yeah. Am I alright to get some food here, or is it—

Yeah, absolutely.

Is that cool?

Yeah, not a problem.

So obviously I'm excited to come up here and see the bees, and I'm excited to blow out the bees and see how much honey is there. I'm excited to taste the honey, but I'm excited about one thing above everything else here, and that is they're going to cook me some lunch here. Oh man, I'm so excited. Everybody knows I love my food. I can't wait to see what's— do you know what's on the menu, Chris?

Uh, it changes every day, so whatever comes in. I hope some of those pork chops we saw getting butchered up before.

Oh yeah. So we saw that at the beginning, pork chops being cut up. I love pork chops. And I love the fact that the menu changes every day. That's brilliant. So what, you just go to the market, see what's good?

Yeah, I mean, it is hyper-seasonal, so we use a lot of local growers. If there's something that hasn't worked out well, we'll get moved on to something else. So we have to be pretty dynamic in this, in this climate.

Amazing. So if you are coming to Manchester for like a concert or something like that and you're looking for a place to eat food, come to Clima. You would never ever know it existed. Obviously it's an award-winning restaurant focusing on wine.

Is that right? Wine-focused and apparently honey now.

Wine-focused, but it's a honey-focused restaurant as well. You can come and sit literally there behind this glass, look at the beehives, watch the bees foraging across Manchester city centre, and eat some of the very best food in the city. Say hello to Chris if you do come by. So Chris is going to put everything back together in the brood box there, put the roof on, and then we are going to blow out the first batch of supers. And I'm really excited, Chris. There is a lot of honey there. I am genuinely surprised at the amount of honey. And you said this is like the second round, so there's 5 Langstroth— sorry, 8 Langstroth Supers in total.

Yes, we took 2 off earlier in the season, then 3 off in a second batch, and then this is the last 3, so 8 in total.

Who says you can't keep bees in city centres and you're not going to get the decent yields? There's another apiary literally just down there that I spotted. First thing I spotted is like, there's another 10 bees over there. And apparently you don't see the beekeepers up there that much?

Well, the hotel's been developed at the moment, so I think they've Probably not been allowed access for a little while. There's a couple of hives that have blown over for a few months, so— but I'm sure they'll be up and running fairly soon. So it'll be interesting to see with the additional competition what next season's like.

Oh, awesome. I love it. You just wouldn't think it, would you? You're walking through Manchester city centre and there's buses and trams and people beeping to get out of the way. People seriously beeping me today. But you wouldn't think, look up on the roof, loads of honey. Right, let's blow them out. Right, so I'm fully hooked on. It's worth mentioning that you can see here we've got a harness that goes all the way along. or like a guide rail. And then you've got these kind of big strong carabiners that I'm not 100% sure how to work, but Chris has fixed me on here, which means that I can kind of get a little bit out here to show you exactly what's going on. So my wife is going to absolutely hate this. My daughter's probably going to hate it as well. But I am sitting on the top of an 8-story building filming bees. But don't worry, I've got my harnesses on. But it is quite a long drop down there. So a little bit scared, I'm not going to lie. Right. So you've got the Makita blower, little one. How do you find the blower?

It's all right. Now I've got 2 more batteries for it. You can Do it a little bit more thoroughly.

Nice.

Have to be quite economical with just one battery. Yeah, it does the job. I prefer it to clearer boards. Obviously we're not allowed too much in the way of equipment up here, so a little handheld rechargeable is perfect.

Cool, let's do it. Yeah, awesome. That's really good.

Lovely stuff.

So city centre of Manchester, Climate Restaurant. One single beehive has produced 8 supers, 8 supers in a single season, 240 pounds upwards of honey, the most delicious honey I think I've ever tasted, certainly the most delicious honey I've tasted this year. I'm off for the most important part of the day now. I'm going inside, going to get myself a pork chop, and I'm going to sit down for a beautiful dinner with skyline views across Manchester.