Southern Alberta to see 'upward trend' in grasshopper population this summer
Grasshoppers are known for their ability to damage gardens and crops, and it seems southern Albertans will potentially have to deal with more this year.
"There is a general upward trend in the county and around the city, and that will continue," said Dan Johnson, an environmental science professor at the University of Lethbridge.
Grasshoppers flourish in hot and dry conditions.
While most people, plants and animals have been suffering through the last few years of drought, grasshoppers have been thriving.
Spring rains can help to keep grasshopper populations down.
Rain limits a grasshopper’s ability to grow when it's in its younger stages.
However, the heavy rain southern Alberta is currently seeing came just a bit too early, according to Johnson.
"The immature stages of the pest species of grasshopper is susceptible to rain and mud and fungus, but they don't come out until the end of May and early June, and then they continue hatching for another couple of weeks."
While the rain may not do much to help right now, there is still hope.
Long-term forecasts are showing May and June could see more rain than in the last few years.
"Our long-range forecasting models are indicating that southern Alberta will likely be normal to above normal for the month of May, and even into June.
"We're seeing that sort of trend that we're going to be having rainstorms," said Alysa Pederson, a warning preparedness meteorologist for Environment and Climate Change Canada.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Drive one of these vehicles? You may pay 37 per cent more than average insurance costs due to thefts
As the number of auto theft incidents rises in Canada, so have insurance premiums for drivers, even the ones whose vehicles aren't stolen.
'I'm not wealthy': Ontario senior shocked she owes $40,000 in capital gains after gifting land
An Ontario senior who wanted to help her daughter and grandson eventually own homes one day decided to give them two lots on her property as a gift—but she didn’t know it would eventually cost her tens of thousands of dollars.
NDP want Liberals to scrap proposed election date change that could secure pensions for many MPs
The federal New Democrats want to amend the Liberal government's electoral reform legislation to scrap the proposal to push back the vote by a week and consequently secure pensions for dozens of MPs, CTV News has learned.
Israel's war cabinet minister moves to dissolve parliament: statement
Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz's centrist party has proposed holding a vote to dissolve parliament in a bid to bring about an early election, his party said in a statement on Thursday.
DEVELOPING BMO clients face outages in Canada, U.S. following data centre fire alarm
Bank of Montreal clients on both sides of the border Thursday morning have reported outages with banking services. BMO said its technical team is investigating.
Exorbitant fees get Gazans out with no help from Ottawa
The comforting sound of giggling grandchildren has chased away the cloud of anxiety that has loomed over Mohammed and Intisar Nofal's home for the past seven months.
Nick Taylor of Abbotsford, B.C., begins RBC Canadian Open defence
Nick Taylor begins the defence of his RBC Canadian Open title this morning.
B.C. mortgage broker ran $270-million Ponzi scheme, then fled Canada, bankruptcy trustee says
The trustee appointed to manage the bankruptcies of a Victoria mortgage company and its owner has concluded that they committed "numerous offences" and operated as a "massive Ponzi scheme."
Want to turn off Meta AI? You can't - but there are some workarounds
If you use Facebook, WhatsApp or Instagram, you've probably noticed a new character pop up answering search queries or eagerly offering tidbits of information in your feeds, with varying degrees of accuracy.