Geospatial Opinion on Unusual Locust Swarm Invasions during Amphan Cyclone

Dandabathula, Giribabu; Verma, Manish; Sitiraju, Srinvasa Rao; Jha, Chandra Shekhar

doi:10.4236/gep.2020.812009

Cited by 3 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…Cyclones in May and October of 2018 brought heavy rains that gave rise to favorable breeding conditions in the Empty Quarter of the southern Arabian Peninsula for at least nine months. Due to this, three generation of breeding occurred that was undetected and uncontrolled; from 2019 onwards, a massive outbreak of desert locust swept across the greater Horn of Africa and Yemen by reproducing the desert locust exponentially (Dandabathula 2020;Sultana et al 2021). 441 and 3725 breeding sites were accumulated for hoppers and adults from the Locust-Hub (2022) database.…”

Section: Brief Background About Desert Locusts'mentioning

confidence: 99%

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Geospatial Analysis For Determination Of Preferential Soil Conditions For The Desert Locust Oviposition

Dandabathula,

Hari,

Ghosh

et al. 2023

EuroJEcol

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Understanding the thresholds of influencing parameters that favor the habitability of dangerous pests like desert locusts (Schistocerca gregaria) can aid in early detection and eradication using control operations. The life cycle of the desert locust and its behavioral changes are associated with the weather patterns and the region’s ecosystem settings. This study attempts to retrieve the preferential soil conditions like texture and moisture at the surface and subsurface levels for egg-laying by desert locusts. Towards this, Locust Hub, a comprehensive database of desert locusts maintained and disseminated by the Food and Agriculture Organisation under the Locust Watch program, was used to identify breeding site locations for 2017-2021. In this research, we extracted sand-silt-clay percentage at these breeding sites using SoilGrids ver. 2.0 from the World Soil Information Service database facilitated by International Soil Reference and Information Centre. Similarly, soil moisture conditions extracted from Level-4 data products of the Soil Moisture Active Passive mission for all these breeding sites aided in essaying the optimal soil conditions for the desert locust’s oviposition. This study’s results confirm the sand percentage in a broad range of 55-70% (for 90% of samples), followed by a narrow range of silt and clay with 19-24% and ~14-20%, respectively. Our study reveals that female desert locusts prefer sandy loam-textured soils for oviposition. The preferred range of soil moisture at the surface and subsurface resulted in 5-10% and 10-20%, respectively. These results confirm that dampness is required at the surface soil for initiating the oviposition by female desert locusts. Results from this research can aid in the early identification of breeding grounds during desert locusts’ invasion period.

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Section: Brief Background About Desert Locusts'mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Specific temperature ranges influence the desert locusts' growth and development during the instar stages, egg development, maturity, movement, and swarm takeoff (Cressman & Stefanski 2016). The wind settings catalyze the desert locusts' movement and migration (Kennedy 1951;Dandabathula et al 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Geospatial Analysis For Determination Of Preferential Soil Conditions For The Desert Locust Oviposition

Dandabathula,

Hari,

Ghosh

et al. 2023

EuroJEcol

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“…When alien species of forest insects infiltrate new environments, the consequences can be far‐reaching, impacting both ecological stability and economic prosperity (Meurisse et al., 2019). Notably, the migration and invasion of locust swarms from the Thar desert region to other parts of India were attributed to the activity of the super Cyclonic Storm Amphan (Dandabathula et al., 2020). Despite the growing body of research on this topic, there remains a critical dearth of data concerning alien bird populations, which presents a pressing concern for the scientific community, particularly biologists and zoologists (Evans & Blackburn, 2020).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Polarimetric Radar Observations of Biological Scatterers in the Eye of Typhoon Lekima (2019)

Huang,

et al. 2023

JGR Biogeosciences

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Tropical cyclones not only cause strong winds and heavy rainfall, but they can also facilitate the transport of birds and insects from tropical regions to areas along their paths. Before super Typhoon Lekima made landfall in 2019, an operational polarimetric radar in Wenzhou City observed biological scatterers in the typhoon's eye. These scatterers were likely birds and insects that were trapped in the calm center of the typhoon by strong winds and heavy rain. The polarimetric variables of these biological scatterers had specific characteristics: low reflectivity factor (ZH) values with a median of 7.5 dBZ, low cross‐correlation coefficient (ρhv) values with a median of 0.65, large differential reflectivity (ZDR) values with a median of 2.8 dB and a maximum of ∼7.8 dB, and widely‐distributed differential phase (ΦDP) values with 25th and 75th percentiles ranging from 1.8° to 36.0° and a median of 20.1°. When the edge of the eye reached the coastline, the birds and insects landed, with the biological scatterer signature changing from a circular shape to a band shape. We further compared Lekima with Atlantic Hurricane Irene which happened in 2011, and both storms had similar polarimetric characteristics contributed by both birds and insects. However, the biological echoes in Lekima better exhibited the characteristics of birds with a larger proportion of samples with ZDR lower than 5 dB as well as large ΦDP and low ρhv values. This finding could help to understand the role of typhoons in driving biological migration between oceans and/or islands and continents.

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