Next you’ll need a collection of natural and recycled materials. For example, you could use any of the following:

• Old drain pipes
• Bricks
• Plant pots
• Broken crocs
• Bamboo canes
• Twigs
• Cardboard
• Tiles
• Pine cones
• Plastic bottles
• Straw

Where to site your hotel

Choose a shady area near to a hedge or a tree. We built ours under trees next to the pond. Ensure the ground underneath is sturdy enough to take the weight, you won’t want subsidence! If you have different sized pallets you should use the largest ones for you ground and lower floor flats. As you work your way up the floors fill each pallet with a selection of your raw and recycled materials. As a guide…..

Bottom floor on a shady side – fill with crocs and small pots to accommodate frogs and toads.

Sunnyside apartments – hollow stems such as bamboo canes or chunks of wood with holes drilled in for solitary Bees. This is where they will lay their eggs.

Lacewing Executive Apartments – roll up a piece of corrugated cardboard and place inside a plastic bottle. Lacewings are your garden pest control so give them the V.I.P treatment.

We used garden soil for our roof and grew a mini meadow the first year. You could plant creeping thyme for the Bees. If you wish you could place a membrane underneath your top floor to retain the soil.

You will soon have an abundance of insects burrowing, breeding, nesting and hibernating in your Bug Hotel, each one with an important role to play in your gardens eco system.

A home for everyone.