Allendale Town is a market town at the heart of the East Allen Valley, set on a ridge above the river in the high moorland of southern Northumberland. The town is best known for its spectacular New Year's Eve tar-barrel celebrations, and it retains a quiet, self-sufficient character shaped by its position deep in the North Pennines. The surrounding moorland carries extensive ling heather from late July through September — one of the finest heather-honey grounds in the north of England — while the River Allen and its tributaries provide hawthorn, bilberry, bramble and meadowsweet in the sheltered valley bottoms. Gorse on the rougher hill edges provides an early spring flow.
Local collectors attend swarms in the sycamore and ash trees of the market square and St Cuthbert's churchyard, in the stone wall crevices and lead-era outbuildings of the older properties around The Square and Allendale Town village, along the hawthorn and bilberry scrub of the East Allen riverside footpaths above and below the town, and on the moorland gorse and heather fringe on the tracks leading up to the moorland plateau above Catton.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
NE46 3NB· approx. 13 km
Visit websiteCA10 1SP· approx. 35 km
Visit websiteNE9 5AX· approx. 42 km
Visit websiteAssociation data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.
The northern moors — Simonside, Redesdale, the Cheviots — carry some of the heaviest ling heather flows in England, with colonies migrated in from as far as the Tyne Valley and beyond. Bell heather opens the late-summer flow; ling finishes it. Sycamore and hawthorn are the dominant hedgerow spring flows. Coastal dune plants at Lindisfarne and Druridge add unusual seasoning. Rosebay willowherb flushes the post-industrial Tyne corridor, and ivy on dark sandstone walls closes the year.
More on beekeeping in NorthumberlandReport it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.
