Grasshoppers for Chickens?

Had an interesting thought as I was driving a tractor swatting grasshoppers away... they've been pretty intense this year in Texas. We always have them, but some years are much worse than others.

I wonder if there would be a clever way to economically trap/catch/harvest them to feed to the chickens? My son can catch them and the chickens gobble them up, but they don't seem to have much luck catching them on their own. It seems like some crushed up grasshoppers would be a great source of protein for the girls.

Any clever ideas for grasshopper traps? 😜

Well this popped up as a linked post! I should have done some more homework first... down the rabbit hole I go...

https://permies.com/t/125691/Amazing-grasshopper-harvest-nets-Philippines

Hi Blake,
I do not mean to disparage your chickens in any way... but my flock would decimate the ones in their pen. They had no trouble catching them. Maybe texas grasshoppers are faster :)... but I imagine if they decided they wanted some, the chickens would be able to figure it out.

Years ago when I lived in California there was a huge outbreak of them, and so I made a big sweep net with some of the fine netting that I was using to protect my young trees.  The veggies were a lost cause, although judicious use of row covers might have saved the day.  A few sweeps of the net over the garden area would procure a full handful of hoppers, and that year we were raising some new layers from chicks and they thrived.

Matt McSpadden wrote:Hi Blake,
I do not mean to disparage your chickens in any way... but my flock would decimate the ones in their pen. They had no trouble catching them. Maybe texas grasshoppers are faster :)... but I imagine if they decided they wanted some, the chickens would be able to figure it out.

Hahaha... I guess I have lazy chickens! I do suppose they can catch them... but it does seem that the chicken run is pretty devoid of grasshoppers while the fields are teeming with them. Maybe they are doing a better job than I'm giving them credit for... or maybe the grasshoppers are just really smart this year! lol.

You do make a good point though... barring lazy chickens or super-intelligent grasshoppers, if I was set up to free range the problem would take care of itself.

Alder Burns wrote:Years ago when I lived in California there was a huge outbreak of them, and so I made a big sweep net with some of the fine netting that I was using to protect my young trees.  The veggies were a lost cause, although judicious use of row covers might have saved the day.  A few sweeps of the net over the garden area would procure a full handful of hoppers, and that year we were raising some new layers from chicks and they thrived.

I bet they loved them. Wouldn't it be cool if you could vacuum all them up, freeze/preserve them some way, and save them for winter time to feed?

I wonder if I could make some sort of light-weight sweep net that was a few feet or more across, attach the kids bikes, and send them tearing across the field? Happy chickens, tired kids... seems like a win-win.

Friend of a friend has an ATV that has two springy pieces of steel out at a 45 in front, and a high powered blower at the bottom of the vee blowing into a big bag. Drives through fields, the wires kick the grass up, and the grasshoppers jump inwards towards the middle of the vee where they get sucked into the bag.


In a more low-tech version, I saw a book once that had plans for what I think was called a "grasshopper tractor". Basically two skids. At the front of the two skids was a wire stretched that does the same thing, causes grasshoppers to jump. Mounted towards the back of the skids was a wide, flat pan filled with water with a thin coat of oil. There were vertical posts to push the contraption at the very back, and a screen between the operator and the pan, so grasshoppers jumped up as the tractor is pushed, bounce against the screen and fall into the oily water to drown. Might be something to tinker with...  

Nick Williams wrote:Friend of a friend has an ATV that has two springy pieces of steel out at a 45 in front, and a high powered blower at the bottom of the vee blowing into a big bag. Drives through fields, the wires kick the grass up, and the grasshoppers jump inwards towards the middle of the vee where they get sucked into the bag.


In a more low-tech version, I saw a book once that had plans for what I think was called a "grasshopper tractor". Basically two skids. At the front of the two skids was a wire stretched that does the same thing, causes grasshoppers to jump. Mounted towards the back of the skids was a wide, flat pan filled with water with a thin coat of oil. There were vertical posts to push the contraption at the very back, and a screen between the operator and the pan, so grasshoppers jumped up as the tractor is pushed, bounce against the screen and fall into the oily water to drown. Might be something to tinker with...  

I can't believe someone has done this! A blower sounds like a good idea... I really am going to brainstorm this more and see if I could do something. Maybe freezing grasshoppers is silly, but if I could catch a substantial amount economically while they are all over, it would make a huge difference in winter feeding.

Thank you Nick!

This has possibilities! I guess my personal caution would be that the 'hoppers are as clean as what they eat. If it's treated with "gick" they would become accumulators, and the chickens would concentrate it up the food chain, leading to hoomans. Maybe paranoid, but it's worth watching.

Also, I vaguely recall reading that chickens gorging themselves on 'hoppers in the 1930's dust bowl gave the meat and eggs an unpleasant flavour. I'll see if I can dig up the reference. It may be better to catch them live and feed them on good stuff for a little while before sending them to freezer heaven.

Blake Dozier wrote:You do make a good point though... barring lazy chickens or super-intelligent grasshoppers, if I was set up to free range the problem would take care of itself.

Well, yes, free range would make it easier for them to catch the grasshoppers, but it would also make it easier for predators to catch your chickens. What I like to do is take an electric net (something like the ones from Premier 1), and move it to a new spot every day or two. This gives them fresh grass and bugs to eat. And if you have a mesh bottom on the mobile coop, then they spread the manure around for you and there is less cleaning of the coop.

Douglas Alpenstock wrote:This has possibilities! I guess my personal caution would be that the 'hoppers are as clean as what they eat. If it's treated with "gick" they would become accumulators, and the chickens would concentrate it up the food chain, leading to hoomans. Maybe paranoid, but it's worth watching.

Also, I vaguely recall reading that chickens gorging themselves on 'hoppers in the 1930's dust bowl gave the meat and eggs an unpleasant flavour. I'll see if I can dig up the reference. It may be better to catch them live and feed them on good stuff for a little while before sending them to freezer heaven.

This thread has spurred me to read more about grasshoppers and I came across an article discussing controlling them with chemicals. I'm not interested in that, but it said one of the challenges with grasshoppers is that they are highly mobile. This would mean, even if I wasn't treated my fields with 'gick' they could be hanging out in others that had been. It's certainly worth nothing and being careful about.

I could see how too much of anything could impact the eggs. You can tell a difference in a chicken egg that has been free ranged vs a commercial egg... so it would make sense that if their diet shifted toward something specific, like grasshoppers alone, it would impact it. Another excellent point to keep in mind.

Thank you for bringing up both of these thoughts.

While it isn't intentionally a trap, I have found some success with my portable paddock system.

I will rotate some mesh fencing around my static chicken coop/run to allow my hens to have time out foraging without letting them completely destroy a section of lawn or garden. By stretching out the mesh netting, it tends to corral crickets and locusts inward. All I have to do is open the door and watch my little raptors go to town on the bug buffet.

At first my hens were a little sloppy with their hunting but they have improved their technique with time. Some of them can even snatch a grasshopper mid flight.

My part of Texas has easy to catch grasshoppers:

https://permies.com/t/59917/Southeastern-Lubber-Grasshopper-Jabba-Hutt

In the evening, the grasshoppers perch on things like fence posts, and I come along and pick them off.  I put them in a bag, and take them to the 6 week old chicks, and month old keets.

We have almost plague levels of grasshoppers this year, which inspired me to get the hatchlings.  The plan is that next year they will be ready to eat the tiny hatchling grasshoppers….

Depending on how long it takes me to build their permanent house, and how long before the grasshoppers get decimated by cold, they may begin eating them later this year.

For now, they devour all the grasshoppers I bring them.

I wonder about egg and meat flavor if the chickens are eating grasshoppers.  People eat grasshoppers ( though I never have).  I’m thinking the grasshoppers are grass fed, and as such should be pretty healthy fodder  themselves.  If they do give a notable savory flavor to the eggs, then I guess I will have to fry onions and garlic to scramble into the eggs, then melt some cheese on top.

i have doubts that they’’d have huge effect on flavor beyond maybe adding ‘richness’.

it isn’t grasshoppers, but we had brood xiv periodical cicadas this spring/early summer and i was feeding my 12 layers sometimes upwards of a full half gallon of cicadas per day for a few weeks. no real noticeable effect on the flavor of the eggs. nice savings on their ‘normal’ food!

My observations: thickens can get the grasshoppers only while the hoppers are a mid to small size and only in low or no vegetation. Even then, of there are more than just a few jumping, the girls don’t seem to be able to track, chase, and catch them.
When the hoppers are too small, the girls either don’t notice them, ignore them, or don’t see them.
When larger, they jump too far out fly away.
In thick vegetation, the hopers hide too well. In talk vegetation, the girls can’t reach them.
So, chickens are not a very good solution most of the time.
I used row covers on the plants that are most favored, a green trap about 20’ away from the garden, and I go out to collect them at night by hand (to feed to my ladies in the morning). Last, I removing my winter mulch from the garden beds a couple weeks early, then shallow till (with a garden rake) to expose the hoppers’ eggs and let the exposure kill them before planting out the garden.
The combination has been working for the last 3 years (but it’s constant, not ideal, and just enough to maintain balance).
Hand capturing:
The hoppers seem to climb up on nearby plants every night to a height between 1-7’ with a preference of 4’. This makes them ideal height to pick (like picking berries off a bush). I use a headlamp and a small bottle to store them in. If there are many (like in mid summer), I target the biggest and the ones that are mating and focus on my garden and fruit trees (most bang for the buck). They are easy to catch. Often I can get 4-5 in a single handful (they congregate in the best perch spots). In my acre, I can readily collect a pint bottle full every night on bad years (where there are many and they are large). Having done this for 3 years, I now get about 1/3 of a bottle full twice a week.
I quickly learned where in the yard they congregate, and which plants they favor most-least. Here, they emerge a couple weeks after the spring rains stop. They start off timely (except the occasional ones that survived through winter), and get bigger throughout the season. As the grow they eat more and more doing most damage the larger they are. They also seem to be able to eat more durable plants as they get older. Very little is safe from them.
They mainly strip the leaves (avoid the fruits, roots) but will leave gnaw marks on cambrien and fruit skins.

Here in Norther Colorado their preference list goes something like this (based on my yard):
They start with: comfrey, potato, raspberry, blackberry, rhubarb, young lettuce, peas, chamomile, blueberry, buffalo berry, sage, mulberry, sun chokes, cabbage, clematis, clover, and most garden flowers.

By mid-season, or once the above is gone: Mint, beats, kohlrabi, okra, turnip, corn, cherry, carrot, onion, cucumber, muskmelon/cantaloupe, currant, sunflower, string bean, oregano, willow, aspen, snowberry, serviceberry, eggplant, basil, and catnip.

Once grown/end of summer: grape, peppers, borage, maple, hibiscus, and peach.

What they seem to leave alone: strawberry, apple, spinach, pumpkin, squash, zucchini, asparagus, watermelon, favabeans, thyme, plumb, linden, evergreens of any kind, naking cherry and privet.

In the Southern California desert there are just a few grasshoppers.  You might see two a week.  But in 2023 there was a plague.  They wiped out all the plants they are not supposed to like and some trees.  They were covering the side of the house.  The garden, which is covered in pretty good shade material on the top and sides did not keep them out.  I put down stacks of Costco Rotisserie chicken containers along the fence and around any plants I liked.  We had stacks of these trays.  Put water in them and the hoppers would jump in and die.  The garden smelled like death.  I would spray the dead ones out of the containers and put more water in.  It was a disaster.

Hoppers like these
- peppermint - yumm - at them back to stems but as you know nothing can kill a peppermint plant so they are still thriving
- rosemary  - ate every single blade off of every stem and it was a few feet.  dead.
- blackberry - all gone - a few varieties - young - their second year
- raspberry - all gone - a couple variety - young - their second year
- oregano - yes they ate this too but the plant lived so there's that!
- artichoke (ate it down from about 4 feet to 5 inches) yumm - it lived.  
- onions - yumm - but the onion patch lived

They didn't like garlic.  After this, I planted a handful of garlic around each new plant.  haha didn't need it for hoppers but ended up with lots of garlic.
They didn't like celery - although they did eat it..  Can't say I blame them.  The nasty celery has just taken over since planting in 2019.  Have to saw it down if it goes too long, which it always does, because it is so powerful strong flavor.


Killed these trees:
- peach - three new peach trees that were covered in new leaves.  The established 13 year old peach was fine.
- walnut - it was established a few years.  The other walnut from the same year was fine - different variety.  
- cherry - two cherry trees died and one lived.  The old one died.  New one lived.  Three different varieties.
- plum - the old plum tree died and the new one lived.  Different varieties.
- apricot - one lived and one died.  Not sure on variety.
(every companion tree I had planted the previous year either died or it's companion died - ugh)
- apple - the baby apple tree died but the rest lived

Trees made it:  fig.  

It might be a stretch to say that any of the trees were fine because in 2024 we didn't get much if any fruit but in 2025 they are back to normal.

The varieties documented, but not memorized, if anybody is interested.

Sorry, this doesn't have anything to do with chickens.   Actually just saw this was the chicken forum.   I didn't have any in 2023.