Great advice about the wood – I didn’t think of that. I will have to wait until the lockdown is over, and ask the environmental conservation centre I’m involved with to give me some untreated wood, they are constantly making stuff and constantly have woodworking session, so they treat the wood themselves as it depends what they are making, and all there wood comes from sustainable sources. So they constantly have a pile of offcuts of wood – which just gets burnt on bonfire night (but during the day for visitors).
And they have already said, take what I need. We create huge bug hotels using natural things for primary schools, so that’s what I’m thinking of doing for the sheltered space opposite the hog house.
The sticks I have used have already dried out, however, there was tons of cobwebs amongst the existing brash pile which the hogs have been using – that brash pile is just fallen bits of confer leaves, and has been left there over the years, so it’s not green anymore, and mulched up, but I’m glad i didn’t get rid of it when I moved in.
