As posted throughout the season, grasshopper broods were prolific in South-Central NJ cropfields this year. Populations were also reported above normal in adjoining states. If you saw defoliating damage or grain damage from grasshoppers this year, it is highly likely more than one brood; and more than one species of grasshoppers (differential, two-striped red-legged) laid eggs on your farm this fall.
As grasshopper outbreaks are cyclic and highly localized, it is important to consider if this was the first, second or third year of pressure on your farm. Please take a moment to read this instructional 1937 publication by George Gilbertson and H. C. Severin “Destroy Grasshopper Eggs’ on how to locate and destroy grasshopper eggs. It is quite informative.
In addition to sampling no-tilled crops followed by another no-tilled crop, sample along hedge rows, adjacent hay fields, and focus on patches of weeds that rarely get tilled. Access bare spots where alfalfa has done poorly and sample both for nematodes (which prey on grasshopper eggs) and grasshopper eggs below the alfalfa crowns. Some species also lay eggs in no-tilled grain stubble roots and associated weeds.
If you sprayed for grasshoppers this year, saw 10%, 20%, 30% crop defoliation, had significant seed damage from grasshopper feeding, or find exeptionally high egg mass counts, please send observations to melissa.bravo@njaes.rutgers.edu. Document what fields, what crop and cropping practices so that brood hatch can be anticipated and monitored next year.
