歪歪漫画

MOORHEAD, Minn. 鈥� Inside the rented garage of an unremarkable concrete-block building in a Moorhead industrial park, summer never ends.

The interior temperature , even as piercing winds blow outside. The air smells earthy, organic and, to the untrained nostril, unidentifiable. (Spoiler alert: It's cricket droppings.) And a symphony of male crickets 鈥� all sounding like tiny, off-key violins 鈥� keep creak, creak, creaking in their hopeful efforts to attract a willing mate.

Welcome to Revier Family Farms.

Here, Pat Revier and his nephew, Thomas Theilen, run what is arguably the community鈥檚 first and only cricket farm. Their days are filled with incubating, feeding, watering, packaging and shipping , ranging from tiny 鈥減inhead鈥� babies to plump and stately adults.

Last February, Pat and his wife, Madeline, is gaining popularity among high-performance athletes and some customers with gluten allergies.

Just 10 months later, the Reviers鈥� operation has grown to the equivalent of a bug bonanza farm, with over 1 million jumping Jiminies chirping, eating, mating and laying eggs in the 300 or so storage bins stacked atop three towering rows of wooden shelves.

News of the Reviers鈥� new venture had already brought in pre-orders for cricket flour.

But for them, the pandemic has been a double-edged sword, Pat says. On the one hand, it created the ideal opportunity for them to quit their jobs and set up a cricketopia. But on the other, the drying equipment needed to dehydrate crickets comes from China, which is already bogged down by material shortages and transportation jams.

The Reviers want a specific type of insect-dryer that鈥檚 designed for high-speed results and smaller operations. They鈥檝e now found a manufacturer in Canada to build a small-scale 鈥渕icrowave dryer鈥� for them. In fact, cricket processing has grown so popular lately that the Canadian company told the Reviers they had received multiple requests recently to manufacture smaller dryers.

The wait, they hope, will be worth it. The huge ovens that bigger companies use to dehydrate crickets can take 5-plus hours to complete the process. But a microwave dryer takes less space and can dehydrate a veritable heap of hoppers in 15 to 20 minutes. 鈥淲e don鈥檛 have many people, so we have to use something that saves as much time as possible,鈥� Pat says.

Although their new manufacturer is closer to home, it could take many months to build the specialized equipment. 鈥淲e鈥檝e got over a thousand pounds of crickets in the freezer right now that we can鈥檛 do anything with,鈥� Pat says.

For now, the Reviers have pivoted by selling live crickets 鈥� either as live food for pet reptiles or as bait for fishermen. Pet geckos, bearded dragons, iguanas and are just a few of the pets that love a good cricket casserole.

鈥淲e just kind of stumbled into this,鈥� Pat says. 鈥淲e had no intention of selling them live. But we had people coming to us because Pet stores are always running short.鈥�

Also, cricket farms often won鈥檛 ship crickets to Upper Midwest reptile-owners for fear they鈥檒l freeze.

The Reviers are hoping to fill that niche and ship their crickets across the Upper Midwest.

So how do they prepare their crickets for winter travel? Rather than invest in tiny earmuffs, the Reviers have perfected their packaging to include longer-lasting heat packs and ample room for air circulation.

In fact, the Reviers have received rave reviews from pleased customers about the healthy hop in their hoppers.

鈥淚f they have enough ventilation, space, food and water, they will stay healthy,鈥� Pat says.

Their crickets are fed a carefully balanced diet of soy, corn, wheat, blood meal, bone meal, brewer鈥檚 yeast and powdered milk, Pat says. It鈥檚 designed to not only raise chipper chirpers, but to also create a healthy food source for the reptiles who eat them. 鈥淭his is one of the things that Madeline researched extensively,鈥� Pat says.

Their chirpy merch is also priced to move: A box of 100 live adults sells for $9, which is significantly below most retail prices. Pat estimates they fill about 10 orders per week, but have capacity to fill many more.

Initially, the couple relied on word-of-mouth for their sales, but plan to grow name recognition and increase revenue via a new website with online store, created by Pat鈥檚 brother-in-law,

Yet another family member is lending them marketing expertise: Mike Brevik of , who is married to Pat鈥檚 niece, has connected them to who is helping develop an online strategy to drive more traffic to their site.

In efforts to create another revenue stream, Pat is working with a local fishing guide

One reservation among bait sellers is that crickets are great for catching crappies and other panfish in summer, but aren鈥檛 something fish would naturally consume in the winter.

But Pat points out that wax worms are consistently used for wintertime fishing, even though they wouldn鈥檛 be naturally available to fish when the coldest season hits.

Now the Reviers are waiting with baited breath to see how the guide's wintertime fishing with crickets turns out. Pat says he would love to prove first hand that fish crave crickets year round, but he鈥檚 been too busy caring for and corralling the jumpy critters.

鈥淚 haven鈥檛 had a whole lot of time to go fishing lately,鈥� he says, wryly.

Orders can be placed through or on Facebook.