Against Insect Plague, Nevadans Wield Ultimate Weapon: Hard Rock (Stereos to Repel Mormon Crickets)

Wall Street Journal ^ | APRIL 24, 2009 | JIM CARLTON

[a fool in paradise]

...Rock music blaring from boomboxes has proved one of the best defenses against an annual invasion of Mormon crickets. The huge flightless insects are a fearsome sight as they advance across the desert in armies of millions that march over, under or into anything in their way.

But the crickets don't much fancy Led Zeppelin or the Rolling Stones, the townspeople figured out three years ago. So next month, Tuscarorans are preparing once again to get out their extension cords, array their stereos in a quarter-circle and tune them to rock station KHIX, full blast, from dawn to dusk. "It is part of our arsenal," says Laura Moore, an unemployed college professor and one of the town's 13 residents.

In flyspeck villages like Tuscarora, crickets are a serious matter. The critters hatch in April in the barren soil of northern Nevada, western Utah and other parts of the Great Basin, quickly growing into blood-red, ravenous insects more than 2 inches long.

Then they march. In columns that in peak years can be two miles long and a mile across... Starting in about May, they march through August or so, before stopping to lay eggs for next year and die.

In between, they make an awful mess. They destroy crops and lots of the other leafy vegetation. They crawl all over houses, and some get inside. "You'll wake up and there'll be one sitting on your forehead, looking at you," says Ms. Moore.

They swarm on roads, where cars turn them into slicks that can cause accidents. So many dead ones piled up on a highway last year that Elko County, Nev., called in snowplows to scrape them off.

Squashed and dying crickets give off a sickening smell. "For us, it's mostly the yuck factor," says Ron Arthaud, a painter here...

[a fool in paradise]

[mgc1122]

Some crap urban music should kill them two counties away ...

[a fool in paradise]

“But the crickets don’t much fancy Led Zeppelin or the Rolling Stones”

Ironically, the Rolling Stones covered the Crickets’ Not Fade Away...

[SWAMPSNIPER]

Big cardboard Helen Thomas dummies wouldn’t be so noisy!

[dblshot]

Ought to keep out the Baptists too.

[dirtboy]

[a fool in paradise]

Is that Arlen Spector on the right?

And Bela Pelosi in the bubble helmet?

[dfwgator]

[dirtboy]

They want to repel them, not drive them into extinction...

[US Navy Vet]

Inport some Sea Gulls!

[a fool in paradise]

They swarm on roads, where cars turn them into slicks that can cause accidents. So many dead ones piled up on a highway last year that Elko County, Nev., called in snowplows to scrape them off.

Do they ever really just use them as snow plows out in the desert? Or are these really cricket plows?

[US Navy Vet]

LOL

[a fool in paradise]

And you can take snow and push it off into the sides of roads, where do you take tons (literally) of dead crickets?

[Slings and Arrows]

(Stereos to Repel Mormon Crickets)

But who's going to clean up all the little bicycles?

[PugetSoundSoldier]

Hmmm... I wonder, have these people conducted an Environmental Impact Study to make sure their wanton use of aggressive acoustical weapons (I mean, we use that against Somali pirates and for TORTURE in Guantanamo!) against Mother Earth’s Darling Little Children?

/sarc

[goodwithagun]

If I remember correctly, there was supposed to be stimulus money for mormon cricket research.

[JennysCool]

Sigh. I live in the area, and while it's nice to see the WSJ do something on our neck of the woods, the station in question doesn't play metal, or even hard rock. It's a Carrie Underwood / Coldplay / Hits of the '80s and '90s kind of thing.

Seems like the reporter could have somehow got that central fact right.

[ErnBatavia]

[a fool in paradise]

You got your chains on your tires???