I Want To Tour A Cricket Farm! Where Do I Go?
Cricket farms aren’t typically open to the public. There’s a number of reasons:
- Disease transmission: farmers don’t know where you’ve been, and if you’re carrying bacteria and viruses on your clothing or skin that could devastate the health of the colony. In the past, there have even been instances of people intentionally contaminating their competitors’ farms.
- Disruption of business: it’s a lot of work to get the farm cleaned up for visitors, and the visit disrupts people from their normal routines. News and film crews can be a particular challenge. Curiosity and a tendency to poke things are fine traits in a journalist but has resulted in a long day of clean-up for many an overworked farmer.
- Comfort of the bugs: We keep them in the dark most of the time for their comfort. Extra hours with the lights particularly affects younger crickets, stressing the poor little buggers.
- It is a business: At the end of the day, a cricket farm is a functioning business, and there’s no real advantage to letting non-employees wander through the facility.
That being said, if you still want to go, there are a few farms that welcome visitors, including:
Flourish Farm in Burlington, VT
Craft Crickets in Eugene, OR
Cowboy Crickets in Bozeman, MT
If you’re looking for a more in-depth exploration of the practical operations of how to run a cricket farm, we offer a 2 day private training at a functional production farm in Hamilton, Ontario.
Do you provide tours of your farm? Let us know here, and we’ll add you to the list!