Usually at about this time of year, I get the old tractor out and slash the grass around block. The grass is fairly well dried out and the slasher can cope. With lots of the so-called grass being onion weed, it's far too difficult to get a good cut when it's green (ask people who have ride-on mowers - blades wear out as if they're made of paper when cutting onion weed).

Anyway it looks like we could be in for a very big locust plague and that will save me having to cut any "grass" on the block. The story below centres on reports of hopper sitings (locusts that have just hatched - the story on ABC TV news last night clearly showed the big patches that indicate hoppers on the ground before they've matured into locusts and start flying).

To see where Mitiamo is in relation to Rushworth, have a look at this map.

Mitiamo is directly north of Bendigo and you can see that Rushworth is south-east of Mitiamo, just in the right type of direction so the norht-east winds, so prevalent at this time of year and blowing today, can carry the swarms directly to my back door.

Quote

Farmers urged to act early and spray locusts. 04/11/2005. ABC News Online