Locust plagues, climate variation, and the rhythms of nature
- Center for Advanced Studies in Ecology and Biodiversity, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile, Casilla 114-D, Santiago CP 6513677, Chile
The ancient records of locust plagues can be traced back to the Old Testament, when locust swarms were one of the 10 plagues inflicted on the Egyptians by God according to the book of Exodus. The impact that these plagues had on agricultural societies in terms of crop damage, famine, and economic loss is so deeply rooted in the psyche of modern humans that even today the vision of a dark cloud of flying locusts disturbs us. Indeed, locust outbreaks represent an important threat in several regions of the planet, including Australia, Africa, and Asia. Because these outbreaks seem to be triggered by climatic factors such as heavy rainfalls, droughts, or floods, a key approach to the problem is to understand the interaction between climate and ecology, which represents a traditional and venerable approach among population ecologists.
Humans have been relating the year-to-year variation in climatic conditions with the abundance of hunting and fishing since the hunter-gatherer period. With the appearance of agriculture, humankind started to learn about the effects of climate on crop yields and on plague triggering. However, humans have failed to notice the long and slow drift of changes in climatic conditions, and only in the last century have we become aware of the long-term changes in climate and their ecological consequences. This …
*E-mail: mlima{at}bio.puc.cl
