Insect Hotel/Motel
With an Insect Hotel/Motel, your friendly guests will never leave – especially when you give them the best breakfast ever – your garden!
In Australia there are approximately 1600 species of native bees and 200,000 species of insects. Only around 62,000 of these have been named so far.
There is an urgent need to assist in establishing a favorable habitat to encourage native bees and insects in the work of pollination of our vegetables and flowers. With this in mind the Marian Grove Landcare Group has recently completed a number of Insect Hotels/Motels for installation near the Community Garden at ‘The Link’ and in the garden area adjacent to the viewing platform on the Marian Grove Forest Walk.
The insect boxes are made from disused timber pallets and filled with a variety of natural products such as carpenters shavings and pine cones.
When you next visit the ‘Link’ Community Garden or the gardens behind units 94 - 112 keep an eye out for our friendly hard working insects and native bees as they carry on the important work of pollination.
Source : Good Living SA Web Site
Taxonomy Aust Web Site
MAKE YOUR OWN INSECT HOTEL/MOTEL
Insect Motels can be made from used timber pallets usually available, free of charge, from factory locations in industrial areas.
Cut timber to required length from the pallet.
Cut the tops at 15 degrees and second section 3 cms shorter, this makes up the 2 walls.
Cut a 3rd section to make the rear of the box.
Glue three sections together.
Cut supports to hang floor and place flooring to make a divided section for different materials.
Various materials can be used such as the following:-
• Logs with holes drilled through them of various widths and to various
depths from 3-10cm.
• Bamboo with nodes
• Holes drilled into untreated timber offcuts.
• Stones.
• Twigs and sticks.
• Banksia or pine cones, clumps of gumnuts.
• Bark.
• Terracotta or clay tiles or crumbling bricks.
Make the roof and floor to hang over the box allowing for run–off of rain water.
Nail and glue into place.
Install materials in to selected compartments of the Insect box.
Drill holes no less than 10cms into timber sticks 3 -10 millimetres in diametre.
Cover areas of cone pines and carpenter shaving with chicken wire for protection from falling out.
Paint box with acrylic based green paint for protection and blending into bushland.
Insect box is now complete.
Frank Kennedy
Marian Grove Resident