Spring is here….achoo! Hail Spring!….sniff sniff! The nasal spray which has not been used all year has officially passed its use by date. By my estimation Spring has not officially sprung in my yard until the first small black grasshoppers make their unwelcome appearance. According to the calendar though, Spring happens on March 19th. Traditionally we celebrate the date on March 21st. All that science doesn’t matter because grasshoppers don’t care whether or not the sun has crossed the celestial equator. They don’t know what the word celestial means. I walked outside to check out the heliconias and I froze in my steps. (Play the theme from Jaws now) It’s that time of the year when you can almost hear the munching sounds of tiny mouths as they chew through your yesterday today and tomorrow. I had been hand watering the new plants placed so lovingly in a garden where I had also placed small pictures of grasshoppers with a vertical slash through them. Somehow, I didn’t think my ruse would work because last year something had partially eaten some of the little pictures and there seemed to be grasshopper spittle in the vicinity. A sure giveaway! Looked like they were trying to make a comeback that rivals the 1969 Amazin’ New York Mets Baseball Team.
I don’t know what you call a group of grasshoppers. Actually, a cloud. Anyway, there were a lot of them happily eating. Young grasshoppers have a relatively Stone-Age look about them and I figured that a creature related in any way to any of the biblical 10 plagues of Egypt was not welcome in my garden.
Even though grasshoppers, who typically arrive in early Spring are related to the cricket; this in no way helps me relate to a childhood crush for Connie Steven’s role as ‘Cricket Blake’ from the TV series Hawaiian Eye. Maybe that’s why I think ‘crush’ when I see a grasshopper. I’ll have to speak to a professional about that. My loathing for anything with an exoskeleton is legendary due to a traumatic viewing at the premier of the movie ‘Alien’.
In the garden and distracted by nature’s feeding frenzy, the dark beasts gorged themselves on my succulents and without even thinking, I nimbly drew my hand along the slim leaf, snatched a cloud of them and flung them angrily to the ground while utilizing my shoe as executioner. I meted out swift justice and reasoned a creature that tiny would not have developed a nervous system complex enough to feel pain. I honestly thought about that scenario immediately afterward.
Also, I had solace in the fact that it was a quick painless death stomp. I know that nature dictates they’ll be back. I hoped those few that escaped would communicate to their brethren about the massacre through a series of leg squeaks or easily heard noises by rubbing their hind femurs against their abdomen. Yes, I looked up grasshoppers in Wikipedia. I even thought about editing the Wikipedia entry, but that was as difficult as catching them when full grown. The grasshoppers; not me.
Those who live in high-rise apartments are not immune to the scourge. I’ve heard of adult hoppers leaping upward from balcony to balcony yes, and gasping for air in the rarified atmosphere as it leaps to penthouse level. When the Nassella tenuissima on your balcony disappears at night while you sleep, you’ve got a lubber who has conquered Everest. Take a photo and then kill it!
You can’t put off trying to rid yourself of these pests. They get noticeably larger each day, in my mind growing to the size of a cargo container. It’s like they’re in training for the Nathan’s Coney Island hot dog eating contest and your yard is the biggest hot dog in the world.
Oh, I’m sure they serve a purpose in nature’s scheme of things, but not my slice of nature. I don’t know where they go at night, but if they get together with their children around the shelter of a Tripsacum Floridana I hope they gather close and tell the tale of giant creatures with the word ‘Neolite’ on their soles which come down like thunder on poor unsuspecting hatch-lings.