Garden Centre

Monday, June 30, 2008

Garden SOS for beetles

Wildlife experts have appealed for gardeners to help in save one of the country's most endangered creatures: the stag beetle.

The stag beetle is harmless, despite its giant size which can cause some consternation when it is seen flying around at dusk, and its very existence is threatened by habitat loss – it has already become extinct in several parts of Europe. The larvae of the stag beetle (Lucanus cervus) thrive on a diet of rotting wood and decaying roots which they consumes for several years before turning into beetles which can grow up to four inches in length. Intense farming and new building in the South of England now put the great at risk of extinction here too. Males are most often seen in flight on warm summer evenings in their search for mates, and they are the ones with the impressive ‘antlers’ which are actually mandibles, while females are often seen at ground level, looking for suitable places to lay eggs. And it is this last part of the insect's lifecycle that experts are asking householders to aid. By burying buckets of woodchip and soil, gardeners could provide homes for stag beetles for the next six years. Here’s what you need to do: make holes in the sides and bottom of an ordinary plastic bucket and fill it with one quarter soil and three quarters woodchip, then just dig a hole in a quiet part of your garden and bury the bucket with the lip at ground level.

Male stag beetle courtesy of Neil Phillips

Labels: garden beetles, garden wildlife

The All Seasons Gardener at 7:05 AM

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