What is it?
It will be on well drained, possibly sandy soil, and ideally south-facing. It’s also more likely to play host to wildlife if it’s protected from footfall, perhaps by being surrounded by shrubs or a fence, or by being on a steep slope.
What does it do?
Mud is an essential building material for many animals that collect it for their nests elsewhere. This can be surprisingly hard to access if the earth is covered in planting, let alone buried under hard surfaces like decking and concrete. Other animals like to tunnel underground, or borrow someone else’s tunnel, whether to nest and nurse young, regulate their body temperatures and keep moist, or simply hide away from predators.
Who benefits?
Many bumblebees and other insects need dry sandy earth patches to nest. Bare mud patches of other soil types are useful for red mason bees and swallows which use the mud to build their nests. Several solitary bee species and their parasitic rival solitary bees and bee-flies lay eggs in tunnels dug into clay banks above paths and streams.
Find out more
Find out more
- This Xerces Society blog is written for North American audiences and their native bees but the basic principles are the same so it’s well worth a read.
- Buglife has a lovely blog about solitary bees and their parasitic rivals nesting in a clay bank beside a path.
