Building an insect house yourself - what you should consider

Before you start building insect hotels with your children, you should think about how they work. Depending on the materials and the plant life in your garden, you attract different insects.

To make your guests feel comfortable, you must consider these tips when it comes to materials:

• For the basic frame of your insect hotel, use the preferably only seasoned hardwood such as ash, beech or spruce. Softwood splinters and cracks too quickly. Your animal friends could injure themselves on it.

• For the filling material, opt for cavity-rich (natural) materials, which insects can easily enter through small boreholes and use for breeding purposes.

• Use only dry filling materials. This way you avoid possible fungal infestation.

• For wild bees, always drill into longitudinal wood and not into end grain, to avoid cracks where parasites could take hold when it's wet.

• Generally, nesting tubes be smooth (especially the entrance), so the animals don't injure themselves when flying in or crawling out.

• Reed and bamboo tubes should only between five and ten centimeters long and have holes in varying diameters from two to ten millimeters have. Avoid chemical fertilizers and wood preservatives.

• Always leave a patch of lawn and some dead wood in your garden. This ensures your animal friends have enough food and space to thrive.

• If you want to paint your insect hotel, make sure to use paint without chemicals or insecticides. In general, it's recommended to keep insect hotels natural. Paint can quickly dry through the hotel and cause fungal growth.

• Besides the materials for insect hotels, the place where they are set up is also crucial for the well-being of the small beneficial insects. Therefore pay attention to an insect-friendly environment with plants that are attractive to insects.

Materials and tools needed for your insect hotel DIY project

Besides a whole lot of anticipation, fun, and a bit of crafty skill, you of course also need the appropriate Materials and tools. The choice of materials is the most important thing for your construction project. Because only if it is accepted by the insects can it fulfill its purpose and serve as protection and shelter in the long term.

So grab your craft tools and get started right away.

Exterior facade:

• Hardwood (especially ash, beech, oak)

• possibly clay

• Timber beams

• Containers such as tin cans, ceramic cups, mugs, or pots

• Clay blocks

• Paint (optional)

Filling

• Straw, wood wool, or reed grass

• Bricks

• Branches & twigs

• Egg cartons

• hollow plant stems such as bamboo, reed, or straws

• Pine & fir cones

• Bark pieces (bark mulch)

Utensils/Tools

• Scissors

• Drill

• Terra Kids hammer

• Wood glue or acrylic glue

• Cable ties

• possibly plaster

• Screws & nails

• Roofing nails

Build insect hotels with children easily yourself – DIY instructions for everyone

Now you probably want to get started right away. Grab the materials you need and your crafting tools and you're ready to go. Let your creativity run free and create a beautiful insect hotel.

Build wooden insect hotels - with our insect hotel kit

Materials needed:

• Terra Kids insect hotel kit

• Screwdriver

• Natural materials of your choice that you can collect in nature

• Craft glue

Here's how:

1. Remove the individual parts of the kit and sort them by size so you have a good overview and can take the right piece as you go.

2. First take the triangle; this will later serve as the back wall of the insect hotel. Now screw the three wooden blocks in a triangular formation to the outer corners of the back wall.

3. To attach the outer walls, take the two large boards from the kit and screw them onto the previously attached wooden blocks. Now you have already fully assembled the basic framework.

4. In the next step attach the metal sheet by placing it on the top point of the roof and then screwing it on as well.

5. Then screw the long wooden beam to the back wall, which will later serve as a mounting bracket.

6. Now it's time for the filling. For this, place the blocks with holes in one after the other. Do this until you have completely filled the insect hotel and nothing falls out.

7. Now you just need to hang your finished wooden insect hotel in the place of your choice.

Build an insect house without a kit

To help wild bees, wasps, or butterflies, you can give them a inviting insect hotel in the garden build. You don't necessarily need a kit for that. With wood, a fruit crate and suitable tools, an attractive home for a wide variety of insects can be created in no time.

Build insect hotels from cans

Required materials:

• a washed tin can (at least ten centimeters high)

• sandpaper

• garden shears

• wool or cotton

To decorate the can:

• colorful yarn

• craft scissors

• wooden beads

• white and black felt

• craft glue/adhesive

• Terra Kids hammer

• nail

• wire

Filling material:

• hollow reed and bamboo stems

• rolls of corrugated cardboard

• pre-drilled hardwood (drill holes in the bark with varying diameters from two to ten millimeters and a tube depth of approx. 12 centimeters)

• wood wool

• fresh straw

• thin twigs

• dry leaves

• pine cones

• bricks

• snail shells

How to:

1. First, clean your tin can and remove all paper labels. Then dry it thoroughly.

2. To prevent both you and the insects from getting hurt on the can, remove the lid and sand the edges smooth with sandpaper. Parents should do this part to avoid children getting injured.

3. Now it's your children's turn. They can do this step entirely without your help: Paint your can in the color of your choice and let it dry well. The tin can can also be turned into an animal itself. For this, wrap the can, for example, with a string, stick felt onto it, or simply paint the details yourself. To make insect legs, make holes with a hammer and nail, thread wool through and tie wooden beads on.

4. While you let your tin can dry, prepare the filling material. Using garden shears, cut your desired filling material to the length of your tin can. Tip: Make sure that the filling material is smooth and not frayed to avoid injuring the insects. Filling materials such as plant stems that are open at both ends should be closed on one side with cotton wool or cotton, since insects only settle in tubes that are closed on one side.

5. Now insert your desired and prepared filling material into the can. The tubes should lie horizontally. Tip: Don't mix the filling materials too much. Rather distribute them over several cans if you plan to build more insect hotels. Insects have different preferences and that way you'll meet their needs.

6. Finally, hang your insect hotel as close as possible to flowering plants, as they are an important food source especially for bees. Secure it well, because the can should not swing freely. If you have built multiple cans, you can also arrange them next to and on top of each other. In such a wonderful hotel setup every insect will find its favorite spot.

Setting up homemade insect hotels – suitable places for your animal friends

If you have built beautiful insect hotels together with your children, it's time to find the right spot in the garden. There are a few tips you should keep in mind.

The right location: sun yes, but not too much

It's best to place your insect hotel in a warm location facing south. A Southeast-facing orientation is ideal. Insects need sunlight to become active. The warmth in spring causes the larvae to start hatching. In addition, insect hotels dry faster if the filling ever gets wet from rain.

But beware: sun is indeed good, but the blazing sun is deadly for insects and their larvae. Direct sunlight – especially in summer – kills the larvae. They are too weak to hatch, let alone survive. Therefore choose a protected spot for your insect hotels, such as under a tree that only gets morning and/or evening sun.

Height and fastening: How to hang the nesting aids securely

For fixing of insect nesting aids there is a rule of thumb that is particularly important: They should be at least installed 50 centimeters above the ground . Make sure that the nesting aid does not sway, but is securely fixed above the ground. This way you ensure that the insects do not come into contact with dogs or climbing plants.

Protection from predators

From birds you can protect your insect hotels with a bird protection net or wire mesh. Choose coarse-meshed variants so that the insects can still pass through easily.

Food sources nearby

It is important that the beneficial insects are provided with sufficient food sources in the surrounding area. If you want your insects primarily to fight pests, place your insect hotels near the infested plants. Otherwise, orchards are also suitable as good locations.

Insect nesting aids can also be placed on your own balcony. If sufficient food sources are not available, you can plant summer flowers in balcony boxes . This will ensure your little friends are well provided for.

Never move insect hotels

Very important: Once insect hotels have been occupied, you must not move them under any circumstances. This is especially true for the winter. Otherwise your insects' larvae will hatch far too early. They are thrown out of their biorhythm so that at warmer temperatures they believe it is spring. Consequently they go searching for food – which is not a good idea in winter, as there is hardly any, and so they would unfortunately starve.

Cleaning and maintaining insect hotels properly

As a rule, you don't need to clean your insect hotels. Especially if it is made of natural materials. You can, however, regularly remove cobwebs. Especially webs from orb-weaver spiders, which usually hang directly in front of the nesting tubes.

If you still want to clean the exterior facade of your insect hotels, you should do so only with water. Use no chemically manufactured wood preservatives, as these are often toxic to insects. As protection against weathering, especially linseed oil, beeswax and other natural wood care substances. These do not deter the insects, as the scents are perceived as natural by them.

You are best off not cleaning the used tunnels in your insect hotels at all. The insects will gladly do that themselves. Some species also wait up to a year for their offspring, which is why when you clean you would only interrupt or even terminate the breeding process.

You generally don't need to replace filling materials either. If damage and gaps have nevertheless occurred due to wind and weather, replace the damaged and missing filling materials only in spring.

Why build an insect hotel?

Create nesting aids and shelter for insects

Insect hotels are in the garden real eye-catchers, but have an even greater benefit than you may be aware of. Because: They are a nesting and overwintering aid for various insect species, whose habitats are increasingly being destroyed. So you offer them a new home and a place where they can live in safety and reproduce. With the building of nesting aids you thus protect them from extinction.

Insect houses for ecological balance in the garden

But the animal inhabitants of insect hotels also help your garden. Whether wild bees, bumblebees or flies – the little helpers are true pest controllers. They free your plants from pests, pollinate them and thus contribute to ecological balance. In summary: By building insect hotels you create new habitats for insects and make gardening easier for yourselves.

Environmental project with children: getting to know native insects

For your little DIY enthusiasts the building project means much more. At least they are wholeheartedly involved, when they get to know the importance and function of insect nesting aids - a sustainable craft idea that promotes both crafting fun and nature conservation. Through such a project, children learn in a playful way to take responsibility. Incidentally, they learn a lot of new things about nature and native insects. In addition, the children's creativity as well as fine motor skills are promoted and thus advance the child's development. Not to forget the pride that fills them when you have finished building the insect hotel and hung it in the garden: you'll surely beam proudly together.

Which insects are the most common guests in insect hotels?

Insect nesting aids are inhabited by a wide variety of insect species. Among the most popular guests are butterflies, ladybugs, bees, and various species of wasps.less well-known insects such as the lacewing or the earwig are among the inhabitants of insect hotels.

All of these insects are not only super interesting to observe, but also incredibly useful for the preservation of nature. Therefore you must pay special attention to one thing when building an insect hotel: Depending on the material, you attract different insects. To give you an overview, we present the most important insect hotel inhabitants and their needs.

Butterflies

Insect hotels are visited by butterflies particularly often in winter. There they find shelter to spend their winter torpor. Normally they choose trees or animal nests for overwintering. If you want these beautiful creatures to move into your insect hotel, you should use thin, flexible and, above all, fresh twigs as filling material set. They also value proximity to butterfly bush and nettles.

Lacewings

The small aphid predators are among the extremely useful guests in insect hotels: especially when you are dealing with pests on bushes and shrubs. Lacewings are particularly attracted to the color red. So if you decide on a red paint or even use bricks as filling material set, you attract these little inhabitants.

Ladybugs

In Germany there are approximately 70 different ladybug species. The best known is probably the red seven-spot ladybug. In general, ladybugs have a big appetite. They eat, besides about 50 aphids per day, other pests such as scale insects, spider mites and fungal infestations on plants. Ladybugs are invaluable beneficial insects and therefore very welcome guests in insect hotels. Plant elder, jasmine and roses near the nesting aid. These plants and flowers ensure that they stay for a longer time and are useful in your garden.

Earwigs

Earwigs use insect hotels as breeding sites and overwintering opportunities. Like lacewings, they also destroy aphids. However, caution is advised with these little residents, because they can even become pests themselves become. If they do not find enough aphids, the earwig will feed on the brood chambers of other insect hotel residents or on healthy plants in your garden. Therefore always keep an eye on them to ensure they have enough to eat in the immediate vicinity.

In general: Do not house earwigs together with wild bees in your insect hotels, because the omnivores go for their larvae first if they lack aphids.

Wild bees

Wild bees are among the most popular inhabitants of insect hotels. About half of roughly 560 species — including bumblebees — are threatened with extinction, which is why they gratefully accept your special protection. If you want to build a bee hotel, you actively support the preservation of these useful pollinators. Wild bees like to nest in branches with holes, old wood or masonry. Once the wild bee young have hatched, the little bees swarm out and pollinate your plants in the immediate vicinity of the insect hotels.

Good to know: Wild bees love bundled reed or bamboo tubes, when they lie horizontally and are closed at the back. Therefore insect hotels made from cans are also suitable for the little buzzers. If you choose hollow bricks, you should close them on one side with clay, plaster, cotton wool or wax. If you use wood, it should always remain dry. Beech or oak are best suited.

Habitat and food for native insects

A feast for the eyes: Turn part of your lawn or a small corner of your garden into a species-rich wildflower meadow: daisies, cornflowers, clover blossoms, knapweeds and other native plants are a veritable paradise for busy fliers and a feast for the eyes for you! Seed mixtures are commercially available. Mowing should only be done after the flowers have set seed.

From crocuses to asters: A tip for bee enthusiasts: Make sure all year round that the busy buzzers have enough to eat. The menu starts in spring with crocuses and pussy willows and ends in autumn with the last asters. Especially outside of summer, bees have difficulty finding food.

A snack garden: A garden where berry plants like raspberries or currants grow is loved equally by children, bees, bumblebees and butterflies. The insects for the flowers, the youngsters for the fruits. Fruit trees such as apple, cherry, pear or plum also attract the busy little fliers during flowering. They enjoy the nectar, pollinate the flowers and thus ensure a rich fruit harvest.

Perennials, shrubs & trees: In perennials, shrubs and trees with single (non-double) flowers, insects find welcome food. Many wild bee species are specialized on certain plants. The more diverse the selection, the better for the bees.

Aromatic herbs: The nectar of the flowers of oregano, lavender, thyme, sage, hyssop, savory and borage is much loved by bees. The herbs thrive in the garden as well as in a roomy container on the terrace or a flower box on the balcony.

Image credits

Child working with father © Halfpoint- stock.adobe.com

Insect house © fottoo - stock.adobe.com