Lancaster is the county town of Lancashire, set on the Lune estuary with a Norman castle above the river and the Bowland Fells rising to the east. The Lancashire BKA covers the city, and the surrounding landscape — the Lune riverside willows and watermeadow margins, the limestone grassland and old parkland of the Caton and Quernmore fringe, the upland heather of the Forest of Bowland and the old orchard and kitchen garden country of the Lune valley — gives local bees a varied upland and estuary season.
Collectors regularly attend swarms in the older walled garden remnants and lime trees of the Castle Hill and Market Square conservation areas, along the Lune riverside willows and watermeadow margins at Halton and Skerton, on the limestone grassland and heather margins of the Bowland Fells above Quernmore, and in the chimney stacks and eaves of the older Georgian and Victorian city-centre properties.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
LA5 9SE· approx. 12 km
Visit websiteFY6 7ST· approx. 26 km
Visit websitePR1 8AP· approx. 33 km
Visit websiteAssociation data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.
Spring opens on sycamore and hawthorn in the Ribble Valley hedges; oilseed rape is present but secondary. Lime fills June in Preston, Lancaster, Blackburn and Burnley. The Forest of Bowland and the Pennine fringe produce bell and ling heather from late July to early September — a classic Lancashire heather flow, thick and commercially migrated to. Bramble is dense; rosebay willowherb flushes Blackburn and Burnley former-mill brownfield. Ivy on stone-built villages and coastal bungalows closes the year.
More on beekeeping in LancashireReport it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.
