As the summer holidays are upon us, we want to share some activities each week to keep you and your children entertained and encourage you to go outside and experience the beautiful nature we have around us! Whether you live in the city, countryside or somewhere in between, they can all be done with things you'll likely have at home or that can be found easily nearby.
Bug Hotel
This is a great option to do in two-parts or as a longer morning/afternoon activity, with a wildlife walk to start with before you build your hotel. A bug hotel is exactly what it is called - a place for insects and bugs to stay! It's great to have a variety of environments to encourage different insects to your hotel such as ants, spiders, beetles and more.
Things you'll need:
- Shoebox or other similar size box
- Cardboard (from any delivery boxes)
- Empty toilet or kitchen roll tubes
- Yogurt pots or a plastic bottle
- Fallen leaves, sticks, twigs, pine cones, moss
- Stones or small rocks
- Sticky tape or glue
What to do:
First, go on a walk in your local area to gather up some of the things you'll need for your hotel - look in nature areas for fallen leaves, twigs, pine cones, stones and moss. Remember not to break anything off a living plant! Once you're home, get the shoebox, cardboard, yogurt pot and tape, ready to make your bug hotel.
- Use the cardboard to divide your shoebox into 'rooms' - you can make them different sizes and shapes as you like. We used some sticky tape to secure the cardboard to the sides of the box to keep the walls in place.
- Fill up each room to create mini environments to encourage different bugs to stay. We would suggest putting the stones/rocks at the bottom for support, and lighter things such as leaves nearer the top.
- Place your bug hotel somewhere a little sheltered so the bugs feel safe and comfortable to make it their home!
Top tips:
- There's no right or wrong way to make a bug hotel so let your imagination run wild!
- Variety is key to attract lots of different insects to stay in your hotel.
- Reinforcing the bottom with a second layer of cardboard can help to make it sturdier when standing up.
- There are small bug hotel kits from many different companies that come with a wooden box, which may be slightly more weatherproof than a cardboard box.
We'd love to see your images, share them with us on social media with the tag #OurFDSummer!
Thanks to Orchard Toys for sharing their bug hotel guide with us below!
