Every summer our yard was overrun with grasshoppers. There were all types from the little green ones to the big Texas sized hoppers. I think my father called them Texas hoppers as an excuse to curse our neighboring state to the East, "Ain't that just like a bunch of damn Texans" was one of his favorite expressions.

On hot summer days my father would crank up the well pump and flood the front lawn and the fun would began. We would beg mom for a jar and head out to catch as many of the grasshoppers as we could. We would study them trapped in their glass enclosures, their big buggy eyes, spiny legs and how they looked like they are chewing tobacco. Eventually we would get board with our entomological study and then the horror would start.

We would take our jars full of grasshoppers and head to the side the pump house. Here my father kept a few chickens in a coop he had built. We would carefully unscrew the lids and then dump the hoppers out. The chickens would go nuts trying to catch as many as they could before the insects escaped through the wire. We would sit back and cheer the chickens on. It was a bloodbath for the grasshoppers, few ever made it out alive, little body parts were scattered everywhere.

Don't worry too much, there were always plenty of grasshoppers left in the wild. As for those who escaped our jars of death, well they probably got chewed up the next time dad mowed the lawn, such is the life of an insect. And in the long run none of my siblings grew up to be serial killers. What odd thrills we use to have in the days before violent video games.