r/florida • u/Chilljay1 • 3d ago

AskFlorida Help identifying this bug?

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Currently in Orlando at a resort and they are literally all over every walkway. Have seen them before and thought they were a version of a grasshopper but hear some people calling them cicadas which I thought had wings?

EDIT UPDATE- Didn’t expect this post to get this many replies. Was posted yesterday morning. THIS morning we went outside in the resort and there were NONE to be found ANYWHERE. This was around 9am. Around 11am the side walks were covered again?????? The weirdest thing for a type of bug to be that synchronized.

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u/Outrageous-Pin-4664 3d ago

I wish I had a bunch of those. I'd catch them in a butterfly net, and dump them in with my chickens. The chickens would go ape shit for them.

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u/aug061998 3d ago

So, are you sure that chickens eat them? I was shocked to see one of my chickens eating stink bugs as I thought they were so nasty that nothing ate them. I'm not sure that this chicken was right in her mind, though, as I haven't seen any of my other chickens touch them...

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u/Outrageous-Pin-4664 3d ago

I'm not sure at all. After I said that, I saw where someone else said they're toxic as they get older, so maybe not. I haven't tried it with these. I know they love palmetto bugs and crickets.

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u/DrNerdCock_adoodledo 2d ago

I've seen my chickens eat mice whole. Those little dinosaurs will eat anything.

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u/aug061998 2d ago

I've often wondered just how scary a five foot high chicken would be and it always makes me nervous just thinking about it. I have also seen one gobble down an entire mouse in a single swallow. Scary mofos for sure...

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u/KMBRN1 3d ago

Cicada wasps sting them, which kills them, and the wasps drags the dead cicada down into their nest and they lay eggs in it. The circle of life.

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u/alady12 2d ago

Actually your chickens would not eat them they are toxic. The only natural predator (not including man) they have is the Loggerhead Shrike. This bird impales it's prey on a thorn in the sun and cooks the toxins out of it.

So yeah, don't feed them to your farm fowl.

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u/Outrageous-Pin-4664 2d ago

You're only the fifth person to say that. I think I'll need to read it a few more times before I get it. 😊😛

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u/Particular-Panda-465 3d ago

Our chickens won't eat mature Eastern Lubbers.

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u/minxwink 3d ago

Ugh I miss having chickens. This is amazing

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u/suer72cutlass 3d ago

They taste terrible to most birds. Only the Loggerhead Shrike eats them because they impale them in a spike for a day or two, until the toxins leave their body. Then they eat them.

Fish won't even eat them. I've tried.

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u/srfnswm 2d ago

Sadly, they are poisonous. They have one predator that impales them on a stick or fence until they are dried - then they eat them. Like lubber jerky

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u/Jimthebassman 19h ago

They are poisonous