Horncastle is a market town on the River Bain and Waring at the foot of the Lincolnshire Wolds, once famous for its horse fair and enclosed by the earthwork remains of a Roman fort. The Lincolnshire BKA covers the town, and the surrounding landscape — the hawthorn and blackthorn hedges of the Wold foot farmland above Wragby and Woodhall Spa, the Bain and Waring riverside willows and watermeadow margins, the old walled gardens and lime-tree avenues of the High Street and Bull Ring conservation area, and the Woodhall Spa heath and birch woodland to the south — gives local bees a varied limestone-Wold and river-valley season.
Collectors regularly attend swarms in the older garden remnants and lime trees of the High Street and Bull Ring conservation areas, along the Bain and Waring riverside willows and watermeadow margins at Roughton and Coningsby, in the birch woodland and heathland remnants of the Woodhall Spa pinewoods and Ostler's Plantation, and in the chimney stacks and eaves of the older market-town and Victorian properties.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
LN10 6PY· approx. 8 km
Visit websiteLN11 0GN· approx. 20 km
Visit websitePE21 6NW· approx. 26 km
Visit websiteAssociation data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.
Oilseed rape is the defining early Lincolnshire flow, enormous in scale across the Fens and Wolds. Field beans, hawthorn and blackthorn carry the hedgerows. Lime and sweet chestnut line the Georgian streets of Lincoln, Stamford and Boston. Bramble is universal, and rosebay willowherb flushes disused airfields and dismantled rail corridors. The Lincolnshire Wolds, though not high, carry sainfoin and chalk grassland herbs. Coastal buckthorn at Gibraltar Point and ivy in the Wolds villages finish a long year.
More on beekeeping in LincolnshireReport it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.
