(Daily Mail) A small town in Nevada is being terrorized by a ‘biblical’ infestation of cannibalistic Mormon crickets that have blanketed roadways, invaded buildings, and alarmed residents.
The two-inch-long pests that have taken over Elko, Nevada are not only devouring all the crops, but are also a traffic hazard leaving roads dangerously-slick after millions of the crickets were squashed by cars, with their entrails creating a slippery surface.
Residents are also dealing with the mob of insects blanketing the ground, crawling up walls, and infesting buildings.
Despite their name, the insects are technically large katydids that closely resemble grasshoppers, according to the University of Nevada, Reno. They don’t fly, but instead walk or hop. And while totally harmless to humans, the bugs are a menace to pests and are frightening locals who are afraid of bugs.
Elko, a small town in Nevada, being terrorized by a ‘biblical’ invasion of cannibalistic Mormon crickets that have left roads dangerously-slick after the pests were squashed by cars
Skin-crawling footage shared on social media shows the town under attack along with several other Nevada counties as the swarm of insects moves across the state
Skin-crawling footage shared on social media shows the town under attack along with several other Nevada counties as the swarm of insects moves across the state.
‘When we looked out here the whole wall was just covered. That really, really freaked me out,’ resident Colette Reynolds told KLAS.
A spokesperson for the Northeastern Nevada Regional Hospital told KSL that the hospital had to deploy brooms and leaf blowers to clear the way for patients to get into the building.
The Nevada Department of Transportation has been plowing and sanding roads to get rid of the squashed bugs that have made the roads slick.
‘You can see that they’re moving and crawling and the whole road is crawling and it just makes your skin crawl. It’s just so gross,’ Stephanie Garrett added.
Residents are also dealing with the mob of insects blanketing the ground, crawling up walls, and infesting buildings
The two-inch-long pests that have taken over Elko, Nevada are also devouring all the crops
The plague-like images also show how dangerous the roads are now with the added layer of squashed bugs
The plague-like images also show how dangerous the roads are now with the added layer of squashed bugs.
‘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,’ Jeff Knight, an entomologist for the Nevada agriculture department, told KSL.
‘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.’
Knight has been treating Nevada’s farmland for Mormon crickets since 1976 and has experienced about 40 outbreaks in that time.
‘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.’
Mormon crickets are named after swarms of the insects destroyed the fields of Mormon settlers in Utah in the mid-19th century
The Nevada Department of Transportation has been plowing and sanding roads to get rid of the squashed bugs that have made the roads slick
