Wotton-under-Edge is an ancient wool town perched on the western escarpment of the Cotswolds, below the scarp of Nibley Knoll and the Tyndale Monument. The town looks out over the Severn Vale — a wide arable and orchard plain rich in oilseed rape, fruit blossom and lime — while the steep Cotswold combes behind it carry sycamore and ash woodland, bramble-smothered limestone banks, and the small chalk streams that give the Ewelme and Little Avon valleys their particular character.
Collectors are regularly called to swarms in the old orchards and walled gardens of the medieval town, in the steep limestone-wall terraces of the Long Street and Bradley Street conservation areas, in the scrubby hawthorn and elder on the Cotswold scarp above Coombe, and in the garden trees and overgrown allotments on the valley-floor fringe of the town.
Nearest BBKA-affiliated associations to help with swarm collection and local advice.
BS32 4PG· approx. 16 km
Visit websiteGL68GA· approx. 17 km
Visit websiteGL15 6BS· approx. 17 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.
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