Mormon crickets swarm Nevada, creating road hazards and delays
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Utah State University explains that they are named so because of the swarms that destroyed the fields of Mormon settlers in Utah in the mid-19th century.
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Shield-backed katydids (aka "Mormon crickets") in a garden. (Getty Images)
Utah-based KSL news shared footage of six counties in Nevada swarmed by Mormon crickets, which are causing both hazards to roads and obstacles to institutions like Northeastern Nevada Regional Hospital, which had to use leafblowers to make way for patients to enter.
An entomologist for the Nevada agriculture department, Jeff Knight, told KSL: “They get run over, two or three come out and eat their buddy, and they get run over, and the roads can get covered with crickets and they can get slick,” adding: “The bigger issue is these afternoon thunderstorms and put a little water on that and it gets slick, we’ve had a number of accidents caused by crickets.”
The insects are closely similar to grasshoppers, and they don't fly but they hop, according to the University of Nevada, Reno. These insects lay eggs in the summer, which remain dormant in the winter and then hatch in the spring.
Knight stated that the large number currently in Nevada can remain at peak for four to six years before being contained by other insects and predators. It is speculated that neighboring Utah may be next.
“The band of crickets in Elko [Nevada] is probably a thousand acres, and we’ve had bands even bigger than that,” he said.
“The drought is probably what triggered them to start hatching. Once they do they have the upper hand, so their populations increase for several years then drop off.”
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Knight, who has been studying Nevada’s farmland for Mormon crickets since 1976, stated that the high populations are not necessarily migrating from one specific place to another, they are instead looking for more space.
“[Population density] is what triggers them to say, “There’s too many of us here, we’ve got to start moving.”
Utah State University explains that they are named so because of the swarms that destroyed the fields of Mormon settlers in Utah in the mid-19th century.
Western states such as Montana, Utah, and Idaho have spent millions of dollars trying to tackle this annual issue.
