Bug zapper = tasty chicken treats?

[StillwaterCreek]

I happened to be out on our back porch last night "admiring" the swarms of beetles and bugs attracted to the porch light, which led me to think about getting a bug zapper. Then I thought: Wow, wouldn't it be great to be able to give the chickens all those bugs? Turn a nuisance into treats and protein! In my mind's eye I devised some sort of tray or bowl to hang beneath the zapper to catch them. I could then give the chickens a treat most every morning...

Is this crazy? Good idea? Anyone else doing something similar?

 

[fernandez0067]

sounds like a good idea to me!

 

[007Dawn]

You can try but usually the chase to get them is the fun part and they will perfer them to be alive!

We catch bugs in the yard and put them in the coupe. It is so funny! One will get it and it wounds up looking like a basketball game. They chase each other try to steal the ball, dodge a chick, dive, duck then slame down the pipe it goes!

OK we don't do much but play in our yard. I know but it is ceap entrainment and the chicks love it!

 

[Glenda L Heywood]

if the chickens like bugs they will eat them
give it a try and see what happens

 

[Tala]

I figured I could just set up a light for them, so they could try for the bugs. I really don't want the chickens sticking their beaks on my zapper, yowza!

 

[WoodlandWoman]

Ours always run over to the zapper, to eat all the toasted bugs in the morning. Then they run off to forage for the day. Live bugs, toasted bugs, they like them all!

We use a zapper with a screen that keeps out small birds and the large moths.

 

[R@ndy]

I haven't done it but I think I will hang one above their run

Thanks for the tip

 

[DarkWolf]

I'd been contemplating making a screened box to place one of those japanese beetle traps into and staking that in the chicken's run. Figure the trap will attract the beetles, hit the screen and then the chickens will have a field day running and catching them.

It'd be fully enclosed to prevent the chickens from accessing the attractant trap itself.

Goes along the line of what you're thinking.. Just in a different way..

 

[chicken+quail=luv]

Our chickens eat almost every bug... including ticks and they try to lunge for misquitoes.

 

[DarkWolf]

So long as they catch the slow, bulky, huge male mosquitoes, I'll be a happy camper for sure..

I hate mosquitoes.

I hate ticks more.