Well done Brighton! Bee bricks are a great way to help our honey-making friends – Hayley Matthews

To compensate for loss of bee population, ‘bee bricks’ have now become mandatory for new houses in buildings higher than four floors in Brighton and Hove.

Bees in Brighton will be able to take up residence in 'bee bricks' installed in some new housing developments (Picture: Fred Tanneau/AFP via Getty Images)

I think it's a great idea and one that more places should adopt. Especially highly populated areas and cities where there are lots of new suburbs growing.

We're taking over the world with our rapidly growing human population and so I believe the very least we can do when building more homes for ourselves, is build some small bug hotels for those little beasties that are so important to us being able to grow crops.

I started to do some digging about the bee bricks, and discovered how something as simple and thoughtfully made as a bug hotel can make a huge difference to helping all the little flying, honey-making creatures that thrive in our gardens and shrubs.

If you don't have access to bee bricks, I've seen bee hotels in pound shops for as little as £3. They also seem quite easy to make as long as there are sturdy hollow tubes for them to hunker down in.

I read one guy saying he'd accidentally made a bee hotel when drilling holes in a brick that he'd forgotten to fill. The bees had taken up residence and it'd been happy days for them ever since!

So a huge “well done” Brighton and Hove. Now, if only we can make bee bricks mandatory in all new buildings nationwide, regardless of number of floors! Just make sure you have a clearly visible “Vacancy – all bees welcome” sign.

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