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Interesting. I hope these katydids don't
come here!
Mormon Plague
Millions of
ravenous Mormon Crickets, moving like an ancient plague, are on the march
across vast swaths of the U.S. West. The insects travel in hordes that can
measure 1 mile wide and 3 miles deep. The insects got their name after
invading the fields of Mormon settlers in Utah in 1848. They're not actually
crickets - rather a species of shieldbacked katydid that belong to a
grasshopper family. Their voracious appetites take in anything. At a density
of just one cricket per square yard, they can consume 38 pounds of forage per
acre as they pass through an area. They will even eat each other. So far Utah
has been hardest-hit with $25 million in damage in the worse cricket
infestation in 60 years. More info on the Mormon
cricket may be found online at http://www.sdvc.uwyo.edu/grasshopper/ansi.htm
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