Bee swarm in Haxey? Help is a minute away.

Haxey is a village in the southern Isle of Axholme, known nationally for the Haxey Hood — an ancient mid-winter game played across the surrounding fields each January. The village sits on a low ridge above the fen, its church of St Nicholas and traditional houses surrounded by the drained moor fields and dyke networks of the Axholme drainage system. The willowherb, meadowsweet and fen bramble on the dyke banks provide productive summer forage, while the restored sections of Haxey Turbary and the damp grasslands around the Idle valley offer a mix of forage types uncommon in the wider agricultural landscape.

Oilseed rape covers vast areas of the clay farmland between Scunthorpe, Brigg and Kirton in Lindsey, delivering a strong April flow that fills supers quickly on well-established colonies. White clover follows through June and July on the river meadows along the Trent and Ancholme corridors. The Isle of Axholme carries alder and willow carr along its drainage dykes — both valuable for early pollen — and bramble is prolific on the earthen embankments of Vermuyden's drainage channels through July. Hawthorn is dense in the hedgerow network on the Wolds escarpment above Kirton in Lindsey and Brigg. Willowherb colonises railway cuttings and roadside verges across Scunthorpe through August. Sycamore and lime shade the older streets of Brigg and Barton-upon-Humber, while ivy on the Humber-facing walls and churchyards in Barton closes the season in October.