Build a Bug House as a 'Winter home for wildlife':

• Prepare this Bug House for them now so they find it before it gets too cold and they stop moving around.
• This special home is called a hibernaculum or ‘ Bug Hotel’ for amphibians  & made from logs or pallets.
• Frogs, toads and newts will use this to help them survive a cold Winter on land.
• Other reptiles and insects would use it too. Bees may nest in the holes in the wood next Spring.
• They will use it any time they need protection - this Summer they would have enjoyed its protection from the direct sunlight.

Build a Bug House in a sheltered, quiet corner of the garden:

Make a quick & easy Bug Hotel:

• The simplest and quickest way to protect wildlife from predators & the cold of Winter is an undisturbed pile of logs and twigs.
• Use different sizes and shapes and leave plenty of nooks and crannies for wildlife to crawl between & hide in.
• Stuff some spaces with fallen leaves, fir cones or grass cuttings to burrow into.

Or build a Bug House with pallets:

• Use one or more pallets to build an overwintering Bug House hotel for amphibians and insects.
• Re-use an old pallet and stuff it with cut logs, twigs, hollow bamboo canes, soil, earth, old tiles, drainpipes or fir cones for ladybirds, beetles and wood lice.
• Try drilling pieces of wood or logs with different-sized holes - some bees, beetles or bugs use these holes to nest in.
• Find anything that amphibians can bury themselves in or crawl in between like moss or dead leaves..
• As an extra bonus add a green roof too.

Or build a more elaborate underground home for them:

• Dig a hole 60cm (2ft) deep and a metre (4ft) across and fill with loosely laid twigs, branches or logs so it looks like a natural log pile.
• Add extra tunnels using pieces of drainpipe of different lengths pointing from ground level into different areas of the hole.
• Half cover with old turf or soil and fallen leaves to make a mound about half a metre high.
• Top off with fallen logs so it looks natural and like any other pile of logs.
• You should only just see the ends of the tunnel (drainpipe) entrances amongst the logs on the outside of the mound.

Whichever design you choose you will be helping the creatures survive the Winter months and maybe also protect them a little if next Summer is as hot as this one.