Rock n' Roll Vs. the Mormon Cricket Invasion

[Jahfin]

Against Insect Plague, Nevadans Wield Ultimate Weapon: Hard Rock

Tiny Tuscarora Counts on Stereos Arrayed In Desert to Repel Hungry Mormon Crickets

By JIM CARLTON

TUSCARORA, Nev. -- The residents of this tiny town, anticipating an imminent attack, will be ready with a perimeter defense. They'll position their best weapons at regular intervals, faced out toward the desert to repel the assault.

Then they'll turn up the volume.

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.

Reno Gazette-Journal

A Mormon cricket crosses a highway north of Sparks, Nev., in a recent spring. The 2-inch-long insects often carpet the arid landscape in the spring and summer, devouring vegetation and driving residents to distraction.

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.

You can read the rest of the article here.

[Electrophile]

The Mormon Crickets could be a great name for a punk band.

[ninelives]

The Mormon Crickets could be a great name for a punk band.

:lol:

[redrum]

Does Buddy Holly know about this?

[bigstickbonzo]

It worked against brutal dictators..

why wouldn't it work against a brutal army...of bugs.