Dursley is a former cloth-making town on the edge of the Cotswold escarpment, looking west across the Severn Vale from the foot of Stinchcombe Hill. The Dean Forest BKA and the Stroud BKA both cover the area. Stinchcombe Hill National Trust reserve carries limestone and neutral grassland with clover, knapweed and bird's-foot trefoil; the valley orchards of the Ewelme and Little Avon rivers contribute apple and pear blossom in May; bramble is dense in the escarpment scrub and the old mill-field hedges; and the Cam valley floor adds white clover and willowherb through summer.
Local collectors respond to swarms in the orchard and walled garden remnants of the older houses in Long Street and Parsonage Street, on the Stinchcombe Hill escarpment scrub and woodland edge, in the barn eaves and old millstone walls of Cam and the Cam Valley, along the Little Avon riparian willows and alders between Waterley Bottom and Wickwar, and in the older cottage chimney stacks of the town centre.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
GL15 6BS· approx. 15 km
Visit websiteGL68GA· approx. 15 km
Visit websiteBS32 4PG· approx. 18 km
Visit websiteAssociation data sourced from the British Beekeepers Association directory via SwarmBase.
The Cotswolds give early blackthorn and hawthorn on drystone hedges, with limestone grassland herbs later. The Severn Vale brings oilseed rape, horse chestnut and hawthorn in the valley pastures. The Forest of Dean is the country flavour — sweet-chestnut coppice, holly, bilberry and a late heather patch on the upper heaths. Bramble is universal; lime and sycamore dominate the June streets of Cheltenham, Gloucester and Stroud. A reliable autumn ivy flow on stone-walled churches carries hives into October.
More on beekeeping in GloucestershireReport it in under a minute and a trained local beekeeper will arrange safe collection.
