Grasshopper infestations may be the worst in decades in some states this year

Grasshopper infestations have taken on mythic tones here on the arid prairie of northeastern Wyoming — they blanket highways, eat T-shirts off clotheslines and devour nearly every scrap of vegetation on ranches and farms. The myth may come closer to reality this summer than at any time in decades in several states in the West and the Plains. A federal survey of adult grasshoppers last fall indicated that parts of Wyoming, Montana, South Dakota, North Dakota, Nebraska and Idaho could face costly grasshopper infestations this summer. Regionwide, surveys predict at least 48 million acres of outbreak-level infestation this summer. "In some states, we may see some of the most severe grasshopper outbreaks that we've seen in nearly 30 years," said Charles Brown, the national grasshopper suppression program manager at the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service.