We have been noticing a ton of wonderful activity around the garden, with large numbers of Swallowtail caterpillars and butterflies (both outdoors as well as on plants inside the greenhouse), honeybees, bumblebees as well as solitary bees making the rounds. We have also seen tree frogs, a couple of Monarchs, Viceroy Butterflies, Buckeye Butterflies and Admiral Butterflies. What are you seeing in your gardens? Do tell! Share your photos to our FB site, #goodbugs
The key to befriending good bugs in the garden is committing to a non-chemical approach (even eco-friendly insecticides such as Spinosad are known to be highly toxic to bees when applied in certain ways), encouraging lots of diversity of plant material (promotes habitats for many different types of good bugs / disrupts disease and pests) and creating a variety of habitats (shade, sun, nooks and crannies for beneficials to take refuge etc) and last but not least getting to know what good bugs look like(we hear many horror stories of gardeners squishing swallowtail caterpillars and ladybug nymphs!).
