Grasshopper Hunters

Meet our hunters: James and Alexander.  This afternoon they went outside to play (these boys love the outdoors) and immediately spied a grasshopper.  With their weapons of choice (James a stick and Alexander armed with the rack from our grill) they began to chase the poor insect.   In fact, I had to ask them a few times to be kind and not kill it.

James wanted desperately to get the creature up onto his stick but no matter how he tried it just wouldn't climb on.  This had much to do with the fact that he kept putting the stick behind the grasshopper instead of in front of it.  Once I stepped in to show him he caught on rather quickly.  He'd carry the grasshopper around on his stick until it jumped off... then the boys would chase him down again to put him on the stick.

I don't know if it was frightened or just friendly but it seemed to like James.  James would pet it and a few times it climbed up on to his arm.  I would have freaked out but James thought it was super cool.  (Actually, the bug did hop onto my bare foot and I did freak out... but just a little bit.)

Finally William decided to join in on the fun.  

There's no way that William would let that grasshopper climb on him but he did find a stick so that the bug could climb from stick to stick and back again.

These boys played for at least 30 minutes with that poor little creature and had the time of their lives!  Who needs a pet when we can play with bugs for free?