Locusts Like It Cool
According to an article in New Scientist, global climate warming may actually suppress plagues of locusts. One less thing to worry about, eh?
Zhibin Zhang of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and colleagues have trawled through 1000 years of historical records documenting locust swarms and compared it with 1000 years of temperature, drought and flood data estimates.That doesn't mean swarms won't happen. (Add this back to the list of things to worry about.) This month in Australia, drought followed by heavy rains in New South Wales has brought enormous swarms of locusts. One swarm is six kilometres long and 170 meters wide.
image from wikipedia.They found that the Oriental migratory locust (Locusta migratoria manilensis), which has been named as one of the most damaging agricultural pests in Chinese history, operates on a climate-driven cycle. Every 160 to 170 years, the swarms get bigger then subside again.
Counterintuitively, the timing of the largest swarms coincides with cooler periods.
"The popular view is that global warming may accelerate natural and biological disasters like drought and flood events, and outbreaks of pests, as predicted by the IPCC," says Zhang. "Our results suggest that warming reduced climatic extremes and locust plagues in ancient China."
Here's a BBC video of the swarms. It's kind of like watching Hitchcock's "The Birds".
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Sure, in China there might not be cooling, but try telling that to Europe: http://www.usatoday.com/weather/resources/askjack/2004-01-08-answers-warming-gulf-stream_x.htm
It's not a sure thing, but the Lotus are probably going to eat you alive. Probably.
looking forward to the Plague of Frog.
http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=RiholfdbB60
I've always been more of a fiery hail person myself.
You can always just eat them. Great source of protein. I love the scene in "Things Fall Apart" when the swarm of locust approaches the village and is greeted with shouts of joy. They're delicious!
Wooooo, creepy and cool all at the same time.
They're supposed to be good eating. I haven't tried them. If I did, I'd order them well done.
The more immediate reason for the disappearance of one North American species that used to have swarms so large that it would blacken the skies was habitat loss.
These insects would oviposit along river banks where the soil was soft and the humidity was higher. But after Europeans settled here, these same areas were very choice farmland; flat, rich with deposits from the river cycles of flooding, and close to a source of water for any necessary irrigation.
This land was put under the plow. The locusts vanished as well as a host of other riparian organisms. We might not miss the locust swarms, but they weren't the only casualties.
If you want to talk about insects that are thriving and expanding their range, let's talk bedbugs.
And it's not an insect, but have you all been following the story of the BRAINWORM that was pulled out of a Phoenix resident's head? Don't go looking until you've got your unicorn chaser all lined up and ready to go. Yipes!
Of course locusts simply know that a cold spell means there's going to be less food, swarm to get as much as possible before the freeze while in warm weather the food is abundant and everywhere as far as locusts care.