Bee swarm in Evie? Help is a minute away.

Evie is a coastal parish on the north shore of the Orkney Mainland, facing the wide sweep of the Bay of Aikerness and the Eynhallow Sound toward the island of Rousay. The Broch of Gurness, one of the best-preserved Iron Age brochs in Scotland, stands on the headland at Aikerness, and the wider parish is one of the more sheltered on the northern coast thanks to the protection of the Eynhallow Sound. The agricultural hinterland is productive improved pasture giving the characteristic Orkney white clover flow from June; the Burn of Pow and the Loch of Boardhouse drain through the lower ground, their margins carrying willows, iris and meadowsweet. The old churchyard at Evie village holds mature sycamores that are reliable swarm gathering trees in May and June.

White clover on the rich improved pastures of the Orkney Mainland is the defining honey flow, running through June and July and producing a light, mild honey characteristic of the islands. Oilseed rape is grown on the better arable ground around Kirkwall, Finstown and the Stenness basin and provides an important April-to-May spring flow. Phacelia, now widely sown as a bee-friendly cover crop by Orkney farmers, extends the arable season into summer. Heather on the moorland ridges of Hoy and the western Mainland fringes from mid-July through September gives late-season colonies a valuable top-up flow. Hawthorn in sheltered croft enclosures and gardens is an important May source, earlier than it opens on the Scottish mainland. Sycamore in the sheltered town gardens and school grounds of Kirkwall and Stromness drives the May urban flow. Gorse on rough grazing ground and cliff edges flowers from March and provides early pollen for spring build-up. Bramble on disturbed and fallow ground through July and August, and ivy on older stone buildings and dykes in October, close the season.