Bee swarm in Currie? Help is a minute away.

Currie is a village on the Water of Leith between Balerno and Juniper Green, where the river runs through a wooded gorge before the valley floor opens into more settled residential streets. Currie Kirk stands above the river and the old mill buildings on the Water of Leith recall the milling industry that once ran the length of this corridor. The Water of Leith walkway passes through Currie with hawthorn, elder, alder and bramble dense on both banks, and the Pentland Hills Regional Park is visible from the upper village streets, with heather moor and gorse accessible within a short walk. The sloping garden policies of the older village properties carry mature apple and cherry trees that supplement the river-corridor forage in spring.

Spring comes later than southern England but catches up quickly on horse chestnut and sycamore in the Meadows, Inverleith Park and Holyrood. The lime avenues of the New Town produce a classic pale, mineral June flow; Blackford Hill, Arthur's Seat and the Pentlands add gorse and broom. Bramble and rosebay willowherb are heavy on every disused railway and quarry corridor. Coastal sea-aster and sea-pink on the Forth shore at Cramond, and a strong ivy flow on Old Town walls, close a surprisingly long urban season.