By David Martin Davies, TPR News
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/kera/local-kera-976041.mp3
San Antonio, TX – As if the drought and wild fires haven't been enough for Texas farmers to be dealing with Agriculture experts are warning of another challenge. The grasshoppers are coming. Texas Public Radio's David Martin Davies reports.
One or two grasshoppers might seem cute and not a problem at all but multiply the hungry insect by a million and Texas will be facing a problem of almost biblical proportions.
And this summer's extreme drought is going to lead to an influx of huge numbers of grasshoppers across the state according to reports by the Texas AgriLife Extension Service.
"Typically when we have dry weather grasshoppers tend to do better then we have wet weather."
Chris Sansone is an entomologist with the Texas AgriLife Extension Service these are not locusts - locusts are a swarm of migratory grasshoppers and these aren't migratory.
Never the less these grasshoppers can do a lot of damage and are another difficulty for farmers who already have enough to deal with.
"This is just one problem piling on top of another. So our plants if they are alive are struggling through the drought anyway then we have grasshoppers taking away the leave material which is providing food for the plants - so that makes it difficult - over in that northeast Texas area because the state has been in a drought hay is extremely short and that's one part of the state that can produce a hay crop that will high value this year so those producers are worried about income and keeping their farms going."