Tees Valley · Swarm collection

Bee swarm in Billingham? Help is a minute away.

Billingham is an industrial town on the north bank of the Tees whose ICI chemical works heritage has left a legacy of managed greenspace and greenway corridors threading through the modern town. Central Park's mature trees, the Billingham Beck Valley Country Park and the farmland of the Billingham plateau carry a strong June clover and hawthorn flow; bramble is prolific on the old works margins and the Teesmouth wetland edges to the east.

Postcodes we cover
TS22TS23
Where swarms appear in Billingham

Typical swarm locations

Collectors attend swarms in Central Park and the Beck Valley Country Park meadow borders, on the eaves and garden walls of the older residential streets off the Town Centre Forum, in the bramble and elder scrub on the former ICI works margins off the A19, and in the allotment and orchard plots on the northern edge of the town toward Norton.

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Beekeeping associations near Billingham

Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.

Association data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.

Forage in Tees Valley

Oilseed rape on the flat arable plain between the Tees and the Cleveland escarpment produces a heavy April to May flow, particularly around Stokesley, Stillington and the fields east of Yarm. Hawthorn and blackthorn are thick in the suburban hedgerows of Stockton, Billingham and Guisborough. Lime trees line the Victorian residential streets of Middlesbrough, Hartlepool and Redcar and carry a reliable June flow. The defining feature of the landscape is the extent of ex-industrial grassland: former ICI works at Billingham and Wilton, steelworks sites at Redcar, and colliery reclamation ground throughout are dense with bramble, rosebay willowherb and white clover from June through August. Sea buckthorn and coastal meadow wildflowers on the North Tees marshes, Coatham Sands and Huntcliff provide a distinctive supplement near the shore. The Cleveland Hills rise sharply south of Guisborough, Skelton and Loftus and carry ling heather and bilberry from late July into September — within easy reach of apiaries on the urban fringe.

More on beekeeping in Tees Valley
Nearby towns

Swarm help in neighbouring towns

Seen a swarm in Billingham?

Report it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.