Bee swarm in Coldstream? Help is a minute away.

Coldstream is a historic market town on the north bank of the River Tweed, facing across the ford and bridge to Cornhill-on-Tweed in England — one of the most significant border crossings on the Tweed. The town gave its name to the Coldstream Guards, formed here in 1650, and the regimental museum in the town centre preserves that history. The Tweed along this reach carries fine riverside willows, hawthorn thickets and elder scrub; the Leet Water, which joins the Tweed at the town, brings additional bankside forage from the north. The Merse farmland east and west of Coldstream is planted with oilseed rape in spring, giving a reliable April-to-May flow, and white clover on the improved pastures extends the summer. Sycamore and lime in the town's older streets and the Henderson Park give early summer forage. The Scottish Borders Beekeepers Association covers Coldstream and this eastern Merse area.

Spring is late; hawthorn and sycamore carry May. Oilseed rape is grown in moderation. The defining flow is ling heather on the Cheviots and Lammermuirs from late July — dark, set, among the best hill heather in the UK. Bilberry in moorland-fringe oakwoods, white clover in hay meadows, bramble in sheltered valleys, and a short autumn ivy flow on stone cottage walls round out a short year.