Once Upon a Time in the Insect Hotel

I'm away from home and from my tools for a while but I wanted to start this little project I've been thinking lately anyway. This instructable will be the concept and plans for an insect hotel I'll create a little later. I'll share the pictures and result then but all the intentions and process of creation will be described here so you should be able to build your own if you want to.

I personally have those memories of children books where friendly bugs are living in nice houses and where all sorts of adventures happens. With this in mind I started sketching my version of the insect hotel.

The idea is to build movable windows, so you can give the bugs in your neighbourhood the shelter you want following the space you have at home, a tree, a fence, a planter...let's create your own garden story.

That's a recycling and nature collecting project. Funny to set up with childs even grown up like your narrator!

For that, you will need:

• wood

I personally have something special in mind for the wood source but you can imagine recycling pallets wood (I use to disassemble them using a brick chisel and a hammer) or other wood left over abandoned in a corner. Old frames or crates would actually be perfect as well.

For my part I have those bags of second hand parquet lamella my friend gave me a year ago. I already used some for a workplan in my kitchen but I still have a lot to use. It should fit perfectly with that project.

• corner fitting to guide your assembling

• wood glue and screw to finalize the assembling. Depending of the wide of your wood, mine is thin so I'm for using the glue but if you use a thicker one, screw or pin could be a better choice.

• fence or something with a mesh, even an orange's net should work.

• organic collecting:

  • hollow stalks like bamboo

  • stalks with pith like, elderberry, buddleia or bramble wood

  • pine cones

• rocks

• bark

There will be a room for each!

Our future roomies have various needs so, each room will need to be filled thinking of these.

I designed a base room who is going to be a start for each type of room.

I will describe 5versions of rooms. You can totally combine or add others following your own knowledge and depending on the materials at your disposal.

The plans where conceived for these little wood pieces I wanted to re-purpose but it could totally work with other materials like bigger wood pieces, recycled packages like milk cartons, crates...It can be deeper, wider. I would adapt the size to the material.

See the image above explaining the starting process to create a 4 chambers structure closed on the back.

We will create 5 of these, then, let's discover what and who they are going to host!

Your renters will thank you by helping in the garden, you'll see...

• Enjoy a walk and collect elderberry, buddleia, hydrangea, charcoal, parsnip, rose tree, raspberry or bramble wood. Any stalk with pith will do. Try to vary the diameters from 2 to 12mm, it will give more choices to the futur residents.

• With clippers, divide them into small pieces so they fit in your base structure and shouldn't go over. Fill it all and that's it.

• This room is ready to welcome a real apartment-sharing. Lacewings, as larvae, should move in and might give you a hand with aphids, cochineal, red spiders, caterpillar... The lacewings adults, pemphedron and some hymenoptera who like to dig their nest in pith will help pollinating.

• install your room at least 1,50m from the ground.

• Collect bamboo stalks or other hollow rod like reed, fennel, hogweed, celery, grasses, forsythia, deutzia... Why not thinking about recycling, reusing drinking straw or creating similar shapes from paper, cardboard...Avoid ink as it can be toxic for our little buddies. Try to vary the sizes from 2 to 12mm, it will give more choices to the future residents.

• With scissors, shears or a saw, divide them into small pieces so they fit in your base structure. Fill it all and that's it!

• This room is ready to welcome lacewings but also the leafcutting bees who will help pollinating. The decomposers like woodlouse, centipede...might join as well.

• Collect pine cones, flat rocks, or bark.

• Fill your structure and close it with a mesh material. You can use tacks on the corners to fix it.

• This room is ready to welcome ladybugs who will be a big help with the aphids. The decomposers (woodlouse, centipede...) could make a visit, they help recycling the organic maters and that way, contribute to fertilize the soil. Carabid might also join, they eat snails and slugs.

This time we will use more wood pieces to create shutters and a window edge

The shutters

• assemble 10pieces to create the left shutter and carve a nice round, squared or why not a heart shape at the center. Use a sharp tool to sculpt your shape. This will be the entry leading to the 4spaces of the shelter. It needs to be a 1cm diameter access to each space.

• repeat to create the right shutter.

• fill your base structure with a straw and soil mixture

• close by fixing the shutters with screw. This will allow to reopen the house to refill if needed.

The window edge

• assemble 4 wood pieces and fix it at the bottom of the window with wood glue.

• this will be a landing strip

This room will let privacy to the bumblebees who will be there for the early pollinating. They use to establish their nest underground or in old burrows. Install this room close to the ground.

• It's possible to create a special suite from a cut log drilled with holes diameter 2 to 13mm. Be carefull not to cross the back of the log, and if so, close it using clay or moist soil for example. Better use hardwood like oak, beech, ash, apple tree, chestnut, acacia…Do not use softwood like pine, poplar who might inflate with humidity. Also, as I like the idea of the window shape, I'm thinking in adding wooden bars but that's totally optional.

• Those will welcome the solitary bees (xylocopa, osmia, anthidium...) special guests who will be really helpful pollinating.

Your renters need:

• a quiet place, away from crossing

• close to a garden, a orchard or wild flowers

• a little raised to avoid humidity (30cm minimum)

• south-est oriented to enjoy the first sun's warmth

• protected form the dominant and north winds

Those windows where designed to be removable and taking small space but could totally integrate a bigger structure, house shaped or else with more arranged areas. I hope it will give you some ideas anyway.

See you, around an other instructable...