Eastern Lubber Grasshopper

[robertwsimpson]

Camera: Canon EOS 50D
Exposure: 0.008 sec (1/125)
Aperture: f/8.0
Focal Length: 200 mm
ISO Speed: 800

This thing was HUGE!

and disgusting.

C&C welcome.

 

[Derrel]

Excellent shot!

 

[robertwsimpson]

Thanks!

Seriously, I've never seen a grasshopper that big.

 

[lvcrtrs]

That's a colorful grasshopper.

 

[DennyCrane]

Terrific shot... You nailed the focus.

 

[robertwsimpson]

Thanks!

It's weird, but now that I have a lens that goes to f/2.8, I find myself using much higher f-stops. f/4 is about the lowest I go, but I'm usually at f/5.6... this one was at f/8!

 

[johnsmith23687]

Here,one beautiful,colorful and full of talented photography performed by you dude.I like the color of this grasshopper.I also impress with the clarity of this lens with the perfect aperture and focal length.I think the camera used by you here is wonderful to capture the images of the natural things.

 

[magkelly]

These grasshopper are cool to look at but where I live between these and the ones they call the American grasshoppers the farmers are seeing their profits for this year just vanish. There was a story on the local news a couple of weeks ago about some people who own one of the smaller farms and they are just losing their business over these things.

I've personally picked 250 of them off my screen door since March. My usual head count for the entire season is about 1/10 that maybe?

They do make good photography subjects I will admit, but the implications of their presence in such numbers this year is just staggering. These things, and some of their relatives, are going to affect food crop availability and prices for the rest of the year, maybe longer.

There are plagues of them in several areas of the country right now. Not just the lubbers, but all sorts of grasshoppers in numbers much greater than normal. In the Midwest and also far out West Coast as well as the South. All of these areas are major ones for the nation's food supply. With the economy as bad as it has been this is a real disaster for some of the farmers, one some of them simply cannot afford.

One guy locally on the news, he was in tears. He'd lost something like 2/3 of his crops for the whole Spring. They just couldn't stop them, not physically and not with spray either. You could see the frustration on his face, and the desperation. He was clearly going under.

Between this and the mess in the Gulf a lot of people are going to end up file for bankruptcy this year, I think.

 

[benlonghair]

That's all true, magkelly, but the part you don't mention is how high in protein they are.

 

[magkelly]

Actually these grasshoppers are not as edible as some. Even most of the birds won't eat them.They spray this brown junk for protection? Apparently it makes them taste pretty bad to potential predators. They're actually not suggested for human consumption unlike some grasshoppers. You could try, and it probably wouldn't kill you, but you'd likely end up with a big, bad belly ache trying to eat a few of these guys. That's part of the reason they're such a problem. Nothing in nature actually wants to eat the freakin things.

That's all true, magkelly, but the part you don't mention is how high in protein they are.