The situation is already becoming traditional for the southern regions of the Russian Federation. Locusts came to agricultural land, which caused the introduction of an emergency regime. Crops are under threat of destruction. A fast-moving locust invasion is terrifying for everyone.
Invasion
Specialists note that locusts have already captured a third of the crops. Funds for its destruction are not enough, and help from the center comes late. A few years ago, this insect was fought on an area of 500 thousand hectares, and now this figure has exceeded two million.
Owners of the fields in the Astrakhan region are still assessing the damage from the locust invasion. Rural plague - so they say about it here, after it there are practically bare fields. In many places, a terrible picture appears before your eyes: streams of insects go along the roads. The war against locusts is carried out with the help of aircraft. The locust invasion in the Astrakhan region brings enormous damage to the whole of Russia.
Orphanland
Astrakhan received new types of equipment and means for processing fields from insects. However, according to farmers, there is little benefit from this: locusts often come from abandoned lands where they are not fought.
No one cultivates ownerless lands from insects. To resolve this issue, a law has been passed allowing the seizure of these plots from the owners. But it is difficult for him to obey. The Ministry of Agriculture confirms that the procedure requires a lot of time. Perhaps such measures will prevent the invasion of locusts in Russia.
For the withdrawal of unused land, it is necessary to prove that they have become less fertile, that the efficiency of their use is low. It must be a decision of the court and the municipality. Selected land plots are transferred through an auction to organizations that intend to use them effectively.
Migration
The locust does not wait for the decisions of the judiciary to be passed and executed, but goes where there is the most food. Pests appear in central Russia and the southern Urals. The Orenburg region has already met with locusts, but every year the number of insects is growing. Farmers comment on locust outbreak and ask for action.
Dagestan is also actively fighting insects: the fields have already been processed several times. However, locusts are still found, the situation in the local Ministry of Agriculture is kept under control. The situation is not yet an emergency, but the rate of locust emergence is higher than the rateits destruction. The region hopes for cooperation on this issue between the regions, without which an effective struggle will not work. Often swarms of locusts fly in from their northern neighbors, which complicates the process of exterminating the pest. The colossal locust invasion in Bashkiria also shocked local residents and farmers.
During the flight, an insect can easily move up to two hundred kilometers in a day. At the same time, no one can predict the direction of movement. As the size of the flock increases, so does the rate of destruction of the crop. As soon as the insects take to the wing, the spraying of chemicals will lose effectiveness. And other countermeasures are still under development.
Methods of struggle
Astrakhan University has developed a special complex for insect control. It lures pests and turns them into animal feed. The creation of a valid copy requires about seven hundred thousand rubles. A sponsor for this project has not yet been found. Perhaps in the future, the locust invasion will not threaten crops.
Monkeys also eat locusts. The zoo in Moscow does not have time to breed them for the needs of monkeys. And this nutrient must be present in sufficient quantities in the diet of animals. According to entomologists, the monkeys, of course, will not cope with all the locusts. The Darwin Museum believes that in order to effectively combat this insect, it needs to be better studied in terms of behavior. The locust invasion in Russia may be deliberate.
The locust swarm has a leader,which it is following. Someone even had the idea to kill the leader so that the rest of the pack would stop moving for a while. They tried to carry out this with a laser weapon, but the result is still unknown, an employee of the Darwin Museum shares.
Absolute victory over the locust, according to scientists, can not wait yet. Science does not know the answer to this question. The Ministry of Agriculture says that there are fewer insects in the country as a whole than a year earlier. They also promised to destroy the locusts before their flight. Farmers who have lost part of their crops are not happy about this. The rest of the farmers are anxiously awaiting developments. Today, a locust invasion is destroying hectares of fields.
