Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-8ctnn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-22T19:00:27.009Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Notes on two Locusts of minor economic Importance in the Sudan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 July 2009

H. B. Johnston
Affiliation:
Assistant Entomologist, Sudan Government.

Extract

The so-called short-horned locusts are frequently, for convenience sake, regarded as comprising two classes: the true locusts (Arabic: Girad) and the short-horned grasshoppers (Arabic : Gabura). It is difficult, however, to find definitions of these classes by means of which every species may be correctly assigned to its true place. The swarming habits of the true locust are often cited as connoting this class only, involving, as these habits do, the periodical appearance of excessive numbers of both hoppers and adults. Moreover the true locust is gregarious, in that the hoppers move in bands from one place to another, and the adults fly in vast swarms often over long distances. The fact that the grasshoppers are solitary in habit and manifest mutual independence of action is often taken as their chief distinguishing character. There is no doubt that these features do partly separate these two classes of insects from each other, but there are certain species which appear to occupy a position intermediate between the two. One normally solitary may, in certain circumstances, multiply rapidly and give rise to hoppers, which in certain respects act like those true locusts. Moreover the winged adults may undertake short massed flights resembling the migrations of swarms. On the other hand the fact, now fully established, that most true gregarious locusts have their solitary forms, which never associate, places even them in this respect with the grasshoppers.

Type
Original Articles
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1932

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

(1) Faure, J. C. 1923. Life-history of the Brown Locust.—J. Dept. Agric. Un. S. Afr., vii, pp. 205224. Transvaal Univ. Coll. Bull, No. 4.Google Scholar
(2) Johnston, H. B. 1924. A Note on Locusts.—Sudan Notes & Records, vii, no. 2, pp. 91101.Google Scholar
(3) Shantz, H. P. & Marbut, C. F. 1923. The Vegetation and Soils of Africa.—Amer. Geog. Soc. Research Ser., no, 13. New York.Google Scholar
(4) Uvarov, B. P. 19231924. A Revision of the Old World Cyrtacanthacrini (Orthoptera: Acrididae.).—Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist., (9) xi–xiv.Google Scholar
(5) Union of South Africa. 1924. J. Dept. Agric., viii, pp. 67.Google Scholar
(6) Vayssière, P. 1926. Les Acridiens migrateurs en Afrique Nord-équatorial.—C. R. Soc. Biogéogr., iii (21), pp. 3436.Google Scholar
(7) Vayssière, P. & Mimeur, J. 1925. Les Orthoptéres nuisibles au Cotonnier et autres cultures en A. O. F.Agron. colon., no, 89, pp. 1112.Google Scholar