It's a hard life raising crops in Australia, as farmers often remind the 85 per cent of Australians who live on the coast. Recent rains in New South Wales provided a bit of relief from the worst drought in a century, but now those living on the land face another challenge: locusts.
Swarms of the crop-munching insects are sweeping across drought- affected areas and feasting on grass and weeds sprouting at roadsides following the rain. In western New South Wales, near the country town of Condobolin, a swarm measuring four miles long by 560 feet wide was spotted last week.
The extra food could increase the number of eggs that the locusts lay, with the next generation expected to begin hatching in mid-December. That is a nightmare prospect for farmers as they prepare to harvest their crops, in some cases for the first time in several years, after successive crop failures caused by the drought.
The Australian Bureau of Meteorology, meanwhile, is forecasting a swelteringly hot summer that will add to farmers' woes, as well as increasing the likelihood of bushfires and their ferocity. On the coast, amid rising ocean temperatures, record numbers of jellyfish have been recorded, along with giant schools of baby sharks.
The locusts have been sighted in plague numbers across large areas of New South Wales, where the state government has distributed enough chemicals to spray nearly 200 square miles on hundreds of properties. The state's primary industries minister, Ian Macdonald, said that many hoppers, or juveniles, would grow wings over the next few weeks, so it was important to control numbers before that happened. Nine locust-busting planes are also on standby to treat the swarms if they grow larger or thicker. At the moment, they are rated as low or medium density.
EDIT
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/locusts-poised-to-destroy-australias-crops-1031241.html
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
