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 Grasshoppers are in abundance in parts of Southwest Nebraska. (Connie Jo Discoe/McCook Daily Gazette) [Click to enlarge] |
Corn plants that had been about a foot tall or taller near the Whipps house between Stratton and Max were gone. Munched to the ground by grasshoppers.
"We've had grasshoppers before," Whipps said. "But I've never seen them like this. The concentrations amaze me."
'Hoppers of all sizes -- Lindy calls the four- to five-inchers "homesteaders" -- seem to be creeping into cultivated crops from acres set aside for conservation practices. "CREP acres are ideal for grasshoppers to go and grow," Lindy said.
CREP (Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program) is a state/federal voluntary land retirement program that helps agricultural producers protect environmentally-sensitive land, decrease erosion, restore/protect wildlife habitat and safeguard ground and surface water. Acres are taken out of crop production and planted with native and/or introduced grasses, groundcovers, wildflowers, trees and shrubs.
Ground residue on CREP plots is not disturbed or destroyed, Lindy said, making it an ideal nesting spot for grasshopper production and growth.
CREP plots provide food sources for grasshoppers, although Whipps said the grasshoppers appear to be moving out of CREP acres into cultivated crops and not into "greener pastures." Grasshopper concentrations in pastures don't seem to be as thick, Lindy said, but it's obvious they're moving into the corn.
"We'll lose it all if we don't spray," he said. A neighbor sprayed his corn for grasshoppers, spraying the edges of an adjacent 300-acre CREP plot.
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The trails appear next to CREP acres; they lighten and disappear when the CREP ends. The trails appear again when another CREP plot appears.
Although CREP practices appear to be responsible in some areas for the proliferation of grasshoppers, CREP plots are responsible, too, Lindy thinks, for an increase in the number of pheasants. A very severe winter in 1983 killed off many pheasants, he said, and their numbers haven't started to come back until the last two years.
"That might be because farmers are putting acres into grass programs," Lindy said.
Grasshoppers are a natural food for pheasants, and for turkeys. "Turkeys love grasshoppers. They should really be gobblin'," Lindy said, "And we have a tremendous amount of turkeys, but just not enough."
CREP program regulations make it the responsibility of landowners or program participants to control pests on the land.
However, one of the major benefits of the CREP program is providing wildlife habitat, so wide-scale spraying is detrimental to that goal, and pest control is limited to spot treatment.
Landowners or program participants with questions about 'hopper treatment are encouraged to contact local Farm Service Agency or Natural Resources Conservation Service offices.
I doubt these are homesteaders as those rarely attack corn. These are most likely differential (Melanoplus differentialis) and/or two-striped (Melanoplus bivittatus) grasshoppers. While they may look like four to five inches long, they are only about 2 to 2.5 inches in length. Don't let that smaller size fool you, they can still eat a lot! The way to tell which they are is differentials are predominantly yellow while two-stripes are greenish with two lighter stripes on top. The former seems to do best on a mix of smooth brome and giant ragweed while the latter seems to prefer sweetclover.
While it is difficult to keep giant ragweed out of field margins, even a few plants can unfortunately foster enormous numbers of Melanoplus differentialis nymphs. Once the plants have been defoliated, the late instars and adults will quickly invade adjacent fields.
CREP areas might also be playing a role as many are dominated by smooth brome, a non-native grass that the differential grasshopper does extremely well on. Add a few forbs to those plots and one has ideal reproductive habitat for both previously mentioned grasshopper species. I wish all the best of luck on this, but rapidly moving bands of spur-throat grasshoppers are difficult to combat as the damage is often done in only a few days, with little time to respond.
If you want my personal opinion, I suspect that if the CREP areas were dominated by native grasses rather than brome, the grasshopper problem would probably be far less severe. In native grasslands in eastern Nebraska I have noted that differentials will decimate patches of smooth brome before they will bother with big bluestem.