Locust plagues were common in ancient times, but why are they disappearing now?

The locust plague has not disappeared, but it has not happened so often, and there was not a very serious locust plague in Africa some time ago.

Because science and technology are very advanced now, there are all kinds of pesticides, and they are killed by pesticides when they are young, and very few can grow up, so it is not easy to produce locust plagues.

Environmental protection, modern wetlands, deforestation, loss of breeding bases for locusts. Modern pesticides are well developed and can effectively kill locusts. Scientific pest control has prevented locusts from forming large-scale locust plagues.

The main reason for the occurrence of the yellow plague is because of the drought, there is very little rain, and locusts will be overflowing.

One of the main reasons why locusts are so easy to infest is that they are very reproductive. Locusts reproduce every three weeks, and it is estimated that each female can lay about 100 eggs, and as many as 300,000 eggs may be present in each square meter of soil, which are not easily destroyed in the ground.

Therefore, as long as the conditions are right, locusts can multiply on a large scale, and the population will increase rapidly. When they fly, they will eat, and locust plagues will appear.

The occurrence of locust plagues is linked to climate change, especially drought. As the old saying goes, "Locusts rise when there is a drought".

The drier environment is more favorable for locusts to multiply, and drought can also force locustsMass migration, gathering

In addition to being very reproductive, locusts are not picky eaters and a variety of plants, including crops, are their food**. And the locusts are very capable of flying, they can fly for hours on end, and the flight range can reach up to 150 kilometers. In just a week, the locusts can fly up to 1,000 kilometers away.

Throughout history, the cost of each locust plague has been very heavy. This year, the number of Asian locusts in Africa and even in Eastern Europe has reached 100 billion, and it can be said that there is no grass everywhere they go, resulting in a great reduction in grain production and extremely threatening people's normal life. The locust plague has been paid attention to in all dynasties, because the people take food as their sky, which is related to the most fundamental survival problem.

As long as it is not controlled, there will be a lot of hunger problems.

First, the locust swarm is very large. Due to the high reproduction rate of locusts and the speed of movement, as soon as they appear, they will be like the wind passing through the sky, and if effective measures are not taken, it will trigger a large number of chain reactions. After they are gathered, they have the ability to gnaw without any grass.

They mutate quickly, newborn, solitary, mild, and ashamed. But once there are more than 60 of them, the color changes and the personality changes. He became particularly irritable, aggressive, and had a great appetite, and began to march in groups.

After the encounter, they merge from time to time, and the group will get bigger and bigger.

Second, the harm is huge. Desert locusts and flying locusts are the most important agricultural pests and the most extinction of migratory pests.

Third, in-depth historical experience. It has been recorded in all Chinese dynasties that in the summer of 2002, more than 100 counties in 13 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities, including Hebei and Xinjiang, were plagued by locust plagues in different ways, and 90 million mu of agricultural and pastoral areas were affected, resulting in great losses. Today, it is mainly locusts that have migrated from abroad.

Fourth, the risk of desert locust swarms invading China remains. Locusts will eat our crops and all green will be swept away, so we need to be prepared for the arrival of locusts and come up with a way to stop the locust plague. In nature, the food chain adheres to a state of relative harmony, and the ecological environment can be guaranteed and optimized.

Species extinction or endangerment affect biological chains and thus ecosystems; And the disaster of certain organisms will definitely destroy the biological chain and ecosystem.

The problem of locusts must be paid attention to, although the current science and technology are thriving, but the environmental problems are intensifying, especially the chain effect caused by climate warming, many viruses that have been silent for hundreds of millions of years are eager to try, many animals and plants have evolved from time to time to adapt to the environment, and have surpassed the original understanding of human beings, locusts are only the tip of the iceberg, and they must be paid attention to.

In 2001, about 10,000 hectares of pastures and arable land in the Staropol region of Russia were attacked by locusts. In 2003, many western states in the United States were hit by locust infestations, and Idaho was the worst since World War II. In November 2004, Israel was hit by a devastating locust plague, with millions of locusts obscuring the sky and the sun, not only gnawing away entire farmland, but also eating the green lawns along the roads.

In China, since ancient times, there is a saying that "locusts are caused by drought", and locust plagues are often accompanied by droughts, and there are records of locust plagues in many historical books. According to the statistics of "The History of China's Famine Relief", the locust plague in the Qin and Han dynasties averaged once a year, with the two Song dynasties as the year, the Yuan Dynasty as the year, and the Ming and Qing dynasties as the year, and the scope and degree of the disaster can be called the world's largest. In addition to locusts, there are also "four insects" (rice planthopper, rice leaf roller, two chemical borer, armyworm), "five diseases" (rice cancer, sheath blight, thin strip disease, rice koji disease, virus disease), "two pests" (farmland rodent pest, grass pest).

They are all farmland killers. Cotton bollworm can damage the bud boll of cotton, stripe rust can destroy the ears of wheat, apple stupid moth can eat into the heart and pit of the fruit, and the ensuing pests and diseases will start from the seedlings of the crop and threaten their growth, so farmers have to be busy for a good harvest of grain. We must cherish food, they are hard to come by.

History of major natural disasters in Jiangsu.

On 21 November 2004, a plague of locusts swarmed millions of locusts into Eilat, an Israeli city on the Red Sea coast, destroying a large number of crops and flowers in the southern Israeli city. Israel** used aircraft to spray insecticides to kill locusts.

In 2001, about 10,000 hectares of pasture and arable land in the Staropol region of southern Russia were infested by locusts, and during the same period, locusts also plagued the Yellow River basin and the Bohai Sea coast in China, as well as in northern Xinjiang, with locust densities reaching up to 10,000 locusts per square meter in some areas. In 2001, the first locust plague was seen in China's Liaoning Province due to a drought that had been seen for the first time in a century.

In 2003, the western states of Nevada, Utah and Idaho were all plagued by locusts, and Idaho was the worst since World War II.

From an environmental point of view, drought is mainly caused by drought disasters.

Habits. From the point of view of its living habits, it is mainly as follows:

1) It has a habit of living in groups.

2) It has strong fecundity.

3) It is polyphagous, that is, it can eat many kinds of plants.

4) It has a strong ability to fly and is difficult to control.

5) Its eggs are hidden deep in the ground and are difficult to destroy.

Locust plagues are prone to flooding after a warm winter.

Global warming, especially the increase in winter temperatures, is conducive to the increase of locust overwintering eggs, providing "eggs" for the outbreak of locusts in the following year. In addition, the combination of climate warming, increased drought, grassland degradation and other factors will provide suitable breeding grounds for locusts to lay eggs, and locusts have a strong ability to adapt to drought, because other insects and birds cannot survive in this situation, and a filamentous fungus that can cause locust disease is suppressed, so its number has increased significantly. Therefore, experts**, with the trend of global warming, the scale of locust plagues will become larger and larger in the future, which will have a serious impact on China's food production.

The formation of locust plague is related to the drought of the climate, "locusts at the end of the drought".