About Bug Boxes

I’ve realized a lot of the things I like start with ‘B’ – Bugs, Bats, Butterflies, Bumble Bees, Birds, just sayin’. In any case, I recently built a Bug Box, which is a small craze all its own. If you google ‘bug box’ you will find an assortment of styles and constructions, sizes, suggested materials along with opinions or essays about what bugs like, including the occasional entomologists chiming in. You can also refine your google search to images to see pictures of all kinds, shapes and styles. You will also find places to buy bug boxes, apparently there is a business in bug boxes, homes for bugs, also known as ‘insect hotels’.

The Best part of Building the Bug Box, was spending several days thinking like a Bug, thinking about crawling around, what might be an interesting place to explore (if you’re a bug), where you might want to spend the night, lay some eggs, look for other bugs, y’know, bug type stuff. I also found myself imagining what types of bugs might ‘check in’ for the night, and realized I was kinda prejudiced against a few types of bugs, like ants, and earwigs, maybe a little bit, spiders which caused me ponder. Regardless I found myself looking around the backyard and bushes and woodpile looking for bugs, to see what types of bugs might be crawling around looking for a home. I really like weirdo Beetles.

Once you are in the mindset, the other thing about building a bug box is choosing materials, really looking around a property at the available leaves, and grasses, and bushes, and seeds, and flowers, and sticks, and assorted anomalies like rusted bottle caps and the like. it was all a sort of meditation, a heightening of ones awareness of ones surroundings, especially from a bugs perspective. I decided on the smorgasbord approach, a little of this, a little of that, whatever I could find that looked promising.

After that there were two other factors involved in building the box, aesthetics and practicality, which I’ll talk about first. After reading a couple of articles about bug boxes and how to build one correctly from people who study bugs more than me, I realized a basic flaw in most of the boxes in a lack of sideways access, meaning the bug can crawl into a hole, but it doesn’t go anywhere, so mr. (or mrs.) bug has to turn around and crawl out the same way., and bug boxes have a lot of holes. So I made sure that the visiting bugs could crawl in the hole and then keep going through intersecting holes or back rooms or passages, so they would stay interested in exploring things.

The second issue was aesthetics, which is more of a human thing. I realized that symmetry was nicer to look at than random design, so I made sure to incorporate design elements like balance, and color, and texture, but with enough variations to be visually appealing (to me, not necessarily to the bugs). For the bugs however, I added an assortment of materials from around the property to be interesting, such as sage, pinecones, bamboo sticks, sunflowers stalks and flowers, bark, corks, leaves and various other debris and found objects, all different colors and shapes and textures, and arranged them in decorative or arranged patterns.

So far results have been mixed. We have a lot of birds around the property, and lizards, so that may have something to do with things, but I am hopeful that I may yet see action, at least a visitor or two. Of course it may not be the best planning, as I am also thinking to do a Bat Box next, and they eat bugs too. Maybe I should do a Bee Hive next instead. Regardless, meanwhile I remain vigilant, and will update upon seeing activity.