Finished my Bug Motel

[flowerbug]

I love when old photos pop up. Here is a beauty that I missed. I build a 9 foot wreath every Christmas. I have always wanted to totally cover it with pinecones. It would take me years to save that many. Beautiful!

this is great to see!

also note that you can put sections of mud near the bottom and then sticks and mud and then just sticks and leaves which can be used by various bees, also various sized hollow sticks/straws/bamboo.

 

[flowerbug]

here are three other links to check out on this topic:


https://permaculturenews.org/2013/10/08/building-insect-hotel/
https://permaculturenews.org/2015/11/02/accommodating-garden-friends-with-an-insect-hotel/

this one is not only about insect hotels, but also more garden related, to see how they can be included:
https://permaculturenews.org/2015/11/10/towards-the-ecological-paris-permaculture-parisian-style/

 

[digitS']

Some gardeners on this thread, I really miss.

I'm left wondering why they visited so often and then not. Of course, if they don't sign in with a new computer, we will never know if they stop by, now and then.

It's more comfortable for me to think of it that way. A bird or butterfly that drifts in and flits about for awhile, checking things out ...

Steve

 

[thistlebloom]

I love when old photos pop up. Here is a beauty that I missed. I build a 9 foot wreath every Christmas. I have always wanted to totally cover it with pinecones. It would take me years to save that many. Beautiful!

I could fit you up with a truckload in no time Cat. Too bad shipping is so expensive.
I collect tubs full during the summer for winter fire starters.

 

[catjac1975]

I could fit you up with a truckload in no time Cat. Too bad shipping is so expensive.
I collect tubs full during the summer for winter fire starters.

I never thought of fire starters. I wonder why ours don't give off a truckload. We have white pine.

 

[catjac1975]

here are three other links to check out on this topic:


https://permaculturenews.org/2013/10/08/building-insect-hotel/
https://permaculturenews.org/2015/11/02/accommodating-garden-friends-with-an-insect-hotel/

this one is not only about insect hotels, but also more garden related, to see how they can be included:
https://permaculturenews.org/2015/11/10/towards-the-ecological-paris-permaculture-parisian-style/

I thought insect hotel was just a joke.

 

[so lucky]

I never thought of fire starters. I wonder why ours don't give off a truckload. We have white pine.

Some years our white pines are loaded with cones. This year, not so many.

 

[flowerbug]

I thought insect hotel was just a joke.

i caulked a few spots around some heat ducts this past spring and it made a huge difference in how many bugs have been getting into the house. then i knew there were some gaps left along the patio doors to do and i finally got those done a few weeks ago and that has cut down even more on the bugs. so perhaps 99.5% of the bugs we used to see haven't been getting in this winter. after 22+yrs, , nice to have it done, but it sure would have been much nicer had i figured this out before... some years i had to vacuum the lady beetles off the windows inside they'd get so many and of course the reek of them...

as an aside to what an outdoors insect hotel can do for a garden. mainly it is to give native insects and bees places to nest. if you are in a brown recluse spider area or have other potentially troublesome spiders or bugs you do want to be careful, but i still think they are well worth putting up. certain hornets eat bugs from the gardens and also some spiders too. and of course vice versa... good to have a complicated web of interactions going than just a few.

 

[catjac1975]

Some years our white pines are loaded with cones. This year, not so many.

I would say never loaded here. Maybe the squirrels eat them?

 

[flowerbug]

I would say never loaded here. Maybe the squirrels eat them?

are they very large trees? our white pines have cones, but i wouldn't call them loaded. we have other types of pine trees that drop a much larger number in comparison.

it could also be affected by where they are planted and what the climate/soil is like it's really hard to pin down some things without seeing the whole situation aka "being there".

the trees have both sexes for making babies on the same tree so that can't be the issue but if you have a high wind location and not many upwind or downwind of each other that can be a factor.

i've not seen squirrels moving the pine cones from them around or eating them but i can't rule that out. the blue jays have been really on the come back here the past few years and i'm glad for it - i see them flying in and out of the white pines most days and i'm not sure if they eat the seeds or move them around or not (they certainly do cache corn all over the place).