Incredible edible grasshoppers !

[outhouse]

Bug granola, veggie-bug burgers, bug fries, bug bait, bug compost, bugon bits , bug-bale housing, fiberbugs, sugar ants , science project feeds family of four !    http://www.foodreference.com/html/fgrasshoppers.html

Anyone else notice the cicadas this year? I have seen them, and lots of grasshoppers too. I think of freerange chickens to eat up the bugs. Came across desert bird called guinea or keet. One person said they put a fence mote around crops and let ravenous chickens stand guard. In some places cicadas are like a symphony of amplified dial-up modems !

[John_C]

I'll have the soy buggers  [smiley=beer.gif]

[glenn kangiser]

Yum.

A bear ate our guineas.  Raccoons, bear, coyotes, ate our chickens except 2.  Bobcat or mountan lion ate our goat.  

I don't think ravenous free range chickens will work here unless they are ravenous free range pterodactyl chickens. :-/

[outhouse]

That's a good point about predators and livestock, Glen. I guess chickens and gamebirds are trickier than that for most of us. I'm not really dealing with it yet, but I hope that attracting wild bug-feeding birds can help too. I'm thinking a few seeds here and there, maybe a house or two, and put a bird bath on my watering schedule. I guess if none of that works, them making them edible kind of provides a little peace...maybe more.  

[glenn kangiser]

We leave our vegetables and flowers to go to seed and have sprinklers on the drip system that the birds love.  Tons of wild birds and we never spray for bugs on the garden.  Not many major problems with bugs.  Some of the wild birds like to peck at plants and eat them when young but after things are going they are not much problem.

[outhouse]

Hey Glen, check these out.  http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/predator.html    http://electric-deer-fence.com/electricdeerfences/electricfencechargers/solarpowered.htm  

Do you guys have deer there? I must say I'm impressed still that those predators are surviving in your area. The less adaptive predators, such as grizzlies and wolves don't seem to be doing as well these days. It's strange how the strongest creatures can be an early indicator that we are often impeding on nature's freedom when we do not respect it.

Here's another link to grasshopper control I will have to absorb before next spring. http://attra.ncat.org/attra-pub/grasshopper.html#bio

[fourx]

Hi outhouse- hey, we even have deer here, someplaces, and they are a real menace on the road.
Did you mention a birdbath?
I have one that attracts heaps of birds..it's just a pit lined with the black plastic that goes under cement slabes with paving blocks around it. Cost about 30 bucks for the pavers and three or four for the plastic. (I tried to post a pic of it but it won't load...)

[glenn kangiser]

We have deer here.

Deer - definition:

Deer: Noun -  A large 4 legged rodent, capable of consuming a years worth of garden in just a few hours.  
        Verb - a method of keeping meat fresh and ready for a survival meal in case of emergency, calamity or meltdown of the system.