Cheltenham is a Regency spa town of wide tree-lined promenades and formal gardens, with the Cotswold escarpment rising steeply behind and the Severn Vale spreading to the west. The lime avenues of the Promenade and Imperial Gardens are among the finest urban bee forage in the county; Pittville Park adds ornamental flowering trees and lake willows; and the Cheltenham & Gloucester BKA covers the whole urban area and its Cotswold hinterland.
Collectors regularly attend swarms in the lime trees and formal garden hedges of the Promenade and Imperial Square, in the large garden trees of the Montpellier and Lansdown conservation areas, on the Cotswold scrub grassland margins above Leckhampton Hill, and in the chimney stacks and stucco parapet walls of the Regency terrace streets throughout the town.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
GL50 1QA· approx. 0 km
Visit websiteGL68GA· approx. 21 km
Visit websiteGL18 1BD· approx. 23 km
Visit websiteAssociation data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.
The Cotswolds give early blackthorn and hawthorn on drystone hedges, with limestone grassland herbs later. The Severn Vale brings oilseed rape, horse chestnut and hawthorn in the valley pastures. The Forest of Dean is the country flavour — sweet-chestnut coppice, holly, bilberry and a late heather patch on the upper heaths. Bramble is universal; lime and sycamore dominate the June streets of Cheltenham, Gloucester and Stroud. A reliable autumn ivy flow on stone-walled churches carries hives into October.
More on beekeeping in GloucestershireReport it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.
