Grasshoppers

Hi everyone! This is Prairie Kid from Alberta. Remember me. I am one of the Canadian brothers. I am the one that owns a cattle ranch and wheat fields.

This past summer I noticed an infestation of grasshoppers. Even though I noticed a lot of them this year, it really could have been far worse. I heard from a friend of mine that the grasshoppers were heading for a bumper year this year because of the drought that we have had in the prairies over the past couple of years. However, many of the grasshopper eggs were killed by the torrential rains that we received in early May.

Grasshoppers can be a real problem on the prairies, especially in the wheat fields. They will feed on the crops and will literally destroy them. It is terrible to drive down a Saskatchewan road and hear the crunch of a grasshopper under your tractor tire but even worse then that is trying to clean the grasshoppers from the windshield. After a hard day working on the field I would have to spend another hour or so cleaning the windshield of my tractor so I would be able to see out of it the next day.

Back in the olden days, I have heard of infestations of grasshoppers to the point of total destruction. They would come in clouds and block out the sunshine and they would eat every crop in their sight. If it weren’t for the rains this past spring, it could have been a very disastrous year for many of the prairie farmers. I think that a lot of farmers would have had to pack it in this year, me included.