Yeovil is a large market town on the Yeo, surrounded by the mixed farmland and cider orchards of south Somerset and with the Hamstone villages of the Ham Hill country park a few miles to the west. The Yeovil BKA covers the town and district, and its collectors are familiar with the mix of orchard flow in spring, clover on the vale pastures in June, and the dry-stone wall and limestone grassland flora of the Ham Hill escarpment in early summer.
Collectors regularly attend swarms in the old orchard and walled garden remnants of the Hendford Hill and Westfield conservation areas, in the Hamstone boundary walls and orchard hedgerows of the villages towards Martock and Stoke sub Hamdon, along the Yeo watermeadow willows and alders at Barwick and Tintinhull, and in the chimney stacks and Victorian terrace eaves of the town-centre residential streets.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
BA20 1HN· approx. 1 km
Visit websiteDT9 6FF· approx. 6 km
Visit websiteTA11 7PY· approx. 14 km
Visit websiteAssociation data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.
The apple orchards of Taunton Deane, Glastonbury and the Tone Valley give an early, intense flow in May; sycamore and hawthorn run behind. Lime scents the streets of Bath and Wells in June; bramble blankets every hedge. The Levels contribute a long late flow on willowherb, loosestrife and himalayan balsam along the rhynes. Mendip provides limestone grassland herbs — wild thyme, marjoram, knapweed — and the Quantocks give a small but real late heather supplement. Ivy closes the year on old orchards and stone churchyards.
More on beekeeping in SomersetReport it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.
