St Mary's is a coastal village in the parish of Holm on the eastern Mainland of Orkney, sitting at the southern end of the Holm Sound where the first Churchill Barrier — the wartime causeway linking the Mainland to Lamb Holm — begins. The village overlooks the sheltered inshore waters of Scapa Flow, and the Italian Chapel on Lamb Holm, built by Italian prisoners of war in the 1940s from two Nissen huts, draws visitors throughout the summer months. The agricultural land of Holm parish is productive improved grassland giving a reliable June-to-July clover flow; the sheltered south-westerly aspect and the low-lying coastal setting provide good flight weather for colonies through the main summer season. The Churchill Barriers road passes through a corridor of old saltmarsh and shoreline scrub between the village and the outer islands.
Collectors attend swarms on the roadside elder scrub and coastal vegetation between St Mary's and the Churchill Barrier junction at Holm Sound, in the garden trees and stone wall voids of the older properties along the village street, on the shoreline vegetation and saltmarsh margins of Holm Sound south of the village, and in the farm steading eaves and stone dykes of the Holm parish croft land on either side of the barriers road.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
NE65 9QH· approx. 410 km
Visit websiteNE12 8EH· approx. 439 km
Visit websiteNE46 3NB· approx. 440 km
Visit websiteAssociation data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.
White clover on the rich improved pastures of the Orkney Mainland is the defining honey flow, running through June and July and producing a light, mild honey characteristic of the islands. Oilseed rape is grown on the better arable ground around Kirkwall, Finstown and the Stenness basin and provides an important April-to-May spring flow. Phacelia, now widely sown as a bee-friendly cover crop by Orkney farmers, extends the arable season into summer. Heather on the moorland ridges of Hoy and the western Mainland fringes from mid-July through September gives late-season colonies a valuable top-up flow. Hawthorn in sheltered croft enclosures and gardens is an important May source, earlier than it opens on the Scottish mainland. Sycamore in the sheltered town gardens and school grounds of Kirkwall and Stromness drives the May urban flow. Gorse on rough grazing ground and cliff edges flowers from March and provides early pollen for spring build-up. Bramble on disturbed and fallow ground through July and August, and ivy on older stone buildings and dykes in October, close the season.
More on beekeeping in Orkney IslandsReport it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.
