Bee swarm in Bilston? Help is a minute away.

Bilston is a small village on the edge of the North Esk gorge, immediately south of Loanhead on the boundary where the Midlothian plateau drops into the sheltered river valley. The gorge woodlands here — steep-sided oak, ash, sycamore and hawthorn above the North Esk — are part of the same woodland system as Roslin Glen, and give Bilston beekeepers access to some of the richest wild forage in the Lothians in an otherwise agricultural landscape. The improved fields above the gorge carry oilseed rape and white clover; the Bilston Burn joins the North Esk below the village and its corridor adds elder and willow to the woodland forage. The former Bilston Glen Colliery site to the north is now a business and employment park with remnant scrub and grassland on the margins.

Oilseed rape on the Midlothian arable plain between Dalkeith, Pathhead and the East Lothian boundary provides a powerful April-May flow that is one of the most reliable in the Lothians. White clover on the improved pastures of the Esk valley floor and the amenity grasslands of the Midlothian towns is the main mid-summer crop from June through July. Sycamore is the dominant May flow tree throughout the council area, with the best sources in the North Esk gorge woodlands at Roslin Glen and Lasswade. Hawthorn on the valley hedgerows and the Midlothian lane margins provides a complementary May blossom flow. Himalayan balsam is establishing in the lower Esk corridors near Dalkeith. Bramble is dense on former colliery and mining reclamation sites throughout the area. The Pentland Hills above Penicuik and the Moorfoot Hills above Gorebridge carry heather and bilberry from late July — modest but accessible upland heather ground within the council area. Ivy closes the foraging year on Dalkeith Palace estate walls and the older stone buildings of the Esk valley villages in October.