Bodenham is a scattered riverside village on the River Lugg north of Hereford, adjacent to the nationally important Bodenham Lake nature reserve — a 60-hectare wetland complex of pools, reedbeds and meadow created from former river-gravel workings. Herefordshire Beekeepers covers the village and the Lugg valley corridor. The Lugg flood meadows at Bodenham carry a superb early-season flow of willow, marsh marigold and meadowsweet; the unimproved grassland and fen margins of the nature reserve add cuckoo flower, hemp agrimony and purple loosestrife into summer; orchard remnants in the old village core bring cider-apple and perry pear blossom in May; and the hawthorn hedges of the Lugg valley enclosures and the ivy on the ancient sandstone church of St Michael and All Angels close the season well into October.
Collectors attend swarms in the mature orchard trees and old farm buildings of the village centre near the Englands Gate Inn, in the willow scrub and wet meadow margins of Bodenham Lake nature reserve, along the River Lugg floodplain hawthorn and alder hedge between Bodenham and Hampton Bishop, and in the old barn eaves and stone garden walls of the farms and cottages on the lanes towards Stoke Prior and Moreton-on-Lugg.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
HR1 2NG· approx. 8 km
Visit websiteHR29PA· approx. 17 km
Visit websiteSY8 1FD· approx. 27 km
Visit websiteAssociation data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.
The season opens on tens of thousands of tonnes of orchard blossom — cider apple, culinary apple and traditional perry pear — across the Leominster and Hereford belt. Hawthorn on deep double-hedges follows; hop gardens provide a quieter supplementary forage. Lime and sweet chestnut dot the market towns. The Black Mountain foothills add bilberry, heather and gorse to hives on the county edge, and bramble is dense throughout. A long, strong ivy flow on red-sandstone churches and orchard windbreaks carries the year out.
More on beekeeping in HerefordshireReport it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.
