Launceston is a hill town on the Tamar at the Cornwall–Devon border, with a Norman castle above the town and the wide valley of the Tamar stretching north and south. The East Cornwall BKA covers this part of the county, and the surrounding landscape — the hedged dairy pasture and old orchards of the Tamar valley, the upland heather of the Dartmoor and Bodmin Moor fringes, riverside willows and meadowsweet along the Kensey and Tamar, and the ancient oakwoods of the lower Tamar — gives local bees access to a distinctive border-country season.
Collectors regularly attend swarms in the older walled garden remnants and orchard plots of the Race Hill and Castle Street conservation areas, along the Kensey and Tamar riverside willows and watermeadow margins at St Thomas and Newport, on the hedgerow oak and hawthorn margins of the Stourscombe and Tregadillett lanes, and in the chimney stacks and eaves of the older town-centre properties.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
PL15 8AB· approx. 0 km
Visit websitePL17 8AX· approx. 15 km
Visit websitePL19 9DA· approx. 19 km
Visit websiteAssociation data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.
The season opens with gorse on every headland, flowering intermittently most of the year but peaking in April. Blackthorn on the cob hedges lights up the byways; sycamore and hawthorn carry the early build; and the slow-growing pittosporum and myrtle in the sub-tropical gardens of the south coast provide unusual supplementary forage. Bramble is dominant through July, bell heather appears on Bodmin Moor and the Penwith commons in August, and the mild autumn leans on ivy and fuchsia hedging well into October.
More on beekeeping in CornwallReport it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.
