April 26 column: Insect hotel
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Our new insect hotel. |
Here is a link to my column in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: Insect hotels keep good bugs cozy. I have to tell you, I’m glad today is finally here because I’ve been so excited about presenting this topic to you!
It’s about adding an insect hotel to the garden, to attract more pollinators and beneficial insects to it… and that’s a very good thing. My husband, Bill, and I recently made one.
As a bonus, I also shot a video showing how our insect hotel went together and the materials we used to fill it with. The two other photos on this blog post are ones I took while at this year’s Northwest Flower & Garden Show in Seattle, just to give you some ideas. Aren’t they cool?
What’s really exciting is that we’ve already got “guests!” We’ve been seeing solitary bees coming and going, and perhaps there are other types of insects we can’t even see in it. I’ve been wanting to take a photo of one of the bees for you but they’re just so darned fast, it hasn’t happened yet! But I’ll keep trying…
I hope this column and the video will inspire you to create your own insect hotel and would love to hear about yours. Just drop me a note at inthegarden@live.com.
Here are some helpful links: