In March were reported fears from Western farmers of record summer grasshopper swarms, and now the Bureau of Land Management is bracing for them by spraying pesticides across hundreds of thousands of acres in northern Wyoming. Some fear this summer "could become the largest outbreak of grasshoppers and Mormon crickets in 30 years," Scott Streater of Environment & Energy Daily reports. "BLM manages 18 million acres in Wyoming, covering nearly a third of the state, and the destructive bugs could decimate the state's agricultural economy."
"We're trying to do the best we can to cooperate with and work with the landowners because their livelihood is at stake here," Ken Henke, BLM's weed and pest coordinator in Cheyenne, told Streater. Henke said cool, wet weather can prevent hatching or kill many of the insects, and therefore "spraying would not be done until regulators observe large numbers of insects hatching, and there is no guarantee that will happen," Streater writes. "If the weather works in our favor, maybe the hatch is significantly damaged and all the preparation we've done goes for naught," Henke told Streater. "But history shows us that's not likely to be the case."
BLM has responded to environmental fears, including the plans' effect on the threatened sage grouse, in its 127-page environmental assessment of the plan. The bureau plans to "include minimum 500-foot vegetation buffers around most water bodies and instructions that pesticides 'would not be applied near water bodies under high wind conditions to minimize the potential for drift,' the assessment says. "While some impacts may be unavoidable, BLM makes clear in its EA that a 'no action' alternative would cause far more damage if grasshoppers and Mormon crickets devour the landscape," Streater writes. (Read more, subscription required)
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