PREPPERGIRL.UK: BUGS, BEES AND BUTERFLIES

Let's remember it's not all about growing food in the garden and consider our friendly bugs and insects too. If you add up the land areas of all the little gardens in the U.K it way exceeds an area greater than all of our national parks added together, that's a lot of space for our insect friends.

LINK - Wildlife in the garden

Keep an unkempt corner in your garden

With this in mind that is a massive collection of unaddressed sanctuary for bugs and bees that could indeed be encouraged, live in harmony and possibly be a positive addition for a little garden.

buglife.org

Consider putting a simple bug hotel together, you can literally make one from rubbish you would have perhaps otherwise thrown away.

LINK: Build a bug hotel

Check out the bug hotel with music

http://saraheitlinger.net/bug%20hotel.html

Even an old bath can prove an insect oasis including some messy fun Too.

FLOWERS

Don't forget the flowers ! Whether you facilitate the use of tubs or plant direct into the ground having a small variety of flowers will help attract otherwise non visitors.

   LINK - The decline of pollinators

LINK - bigbutterflycount.org/
Saving an exhausted bee with sugar water.

LINK - Beneficial insects

You can create a mini ecosystem which will introduce a further variety of life into your garden with a pond, even a simple micro pond will support newbies, we have frogs and dragonfly among a host of others finding ours. Just about any tough basic container will do. Remember not to allow your established pond to dry out at any stage.
This pond is a baby bath, teems with life, water bugs, snails etc with a nice growth of medicinal aquatic mint from late spring through summer.

Our second micro pond i salvaged from a larger split pond someone had thrown out, it's the deep section i cut and removed, makes an ideal little pond.