Rod Stewart's secret hobby at home is also a major celebrity obsession

The Daily Star has revealed that Rod Stewart has eight hives and a whopping 320,000 bees in the grounds of his Hertfordshire mansion. Rod's wife Penny Lancaster told the publication: "With our mature fruit trees, other native plants and surrounding farmers' land our garden is the perfect home for bees. We have eight hives plus a shed for extracting and storing honey." The singer has two hits with the word honey in the title, so really we should have predicted this hobby was coming!

In 2020, Ed made his beekeeping debut online, revealing that he has hives on his 16-acre "Sheeranville" estate. In keeping with the wholesome nature theme, the star has vegetable patches on site and likes to grow his own produce.

Someone else who's into homegrown produce and has a love for bees is Loose Women star Stacey Solomon. The mum-of-five has transformed Pickle cottage since living there and one of the things she chose to add was beehives. 

When Stacey was in the early days of her hobby, she reached out to bee aficionado Sir David Beckham. In an Instagram message, she said to him: "I'm getting a beehive and I know you and Victoria have got bees and they're a big part of your life, so I just wondered if you had any top tips or advice. I'm already regretting sending you this message because I know you'll never see it, or hear it, and if you do, you'll probably think I'm a weirdo." And proof of the mantra: 'If you don't ask, you don't get,' Stacey did get a reply, and she was even sent some of David's signature homegrown honey called BEEUP.

David Beckham got the bug (pardon the pun) in 2020 when he acquired his first beehive. Since then he's grown his collection and we've seen him don his protective outfit and get stuck into honey collection plenty of times online. The star even has his own range of honey-based snacks, and the brand's website reads: "My love of beekeeping and making my own honey began as a hobby and quickly grew into a passion. I built the hives with my sons, learned how to care for the bees, and mastered the art of harvesting one of nature’s most powerful superfoods."

We've all got the same 24 hours in the day as Beyonce, and it turns out she spends some of hers, beekeeping!

During an interview with Vogue in 2020, she made the surprising revelation: "I know it's random, but I have two beehives. Real ones," she shared. "I've had them at my house for a while now. I have around 80,000 bees, and we make hundreds of jars of honey a year."

The mum-of-three continued: "I started the beehives because my daughters, Blue and Rumi, both have terrible allergies, and honey has countless healing properties." 

I've written alot about King Charles during my five years at HELLO! and he makes no secret of his love for the environment, and appreciating wildlife is a big part of that. Buckingham Palace is home to four beehives and Clarence House is home to two beehives. They tend to produce around 300 jars of honey each year for use in the royal kitchens.

As well as His Majesty's collection, his wife Queen Camilla has her own beehives at her private estate in Wiltshire. The royal family's website explains that she is a "keen beekeeper" and that she "produces her own honey at home in Wiltshire which is sold at Fortnum & Mason to raise money for charity".

To celebrate World Bee Day in 2023, Princess Kate shared a photograph of herself at her Norfolk home, Anmer Hall, getting stuck into collecting at her own beehives, dressed in a full beekeeper suit. She smiled through the netted face covering while confidently handling the bees and their honey.

Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's idyllic Montecito base is the perfect place for homegrown food and wholesome pastimes, so it was clearly enitivible that Meghan would end up with hives there. Her beekeeper, Branden Aroyan, spoke to the MailOnline about the Duchess' 100,000 bee colony. He spoke about how Meghan's passion has extended to the wider family. "The entire time she’s like a giddy teenager," he said, adding: "Harry loves it, and Archie and Lilibet are into it too. It’s a whole family affair. They all have their own beekeeper suits. They’re just all super-fascinated by it."