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TOOELE — A widespread infestation of grasshoppers has taken over Tooele County.
"One of the counts was 30 to 40 per square yard," Linden Greenhalch with Utah State University Extension Services said. "I think it's greater than that. I just call it too numerous to count."
Greenhalch said the area is getting hammered because crews are restricted from applying insecticide by plane. Thus, only 600 acres have been treated.
He said the hungry grasshoppers are causing a lot of damage.
"They'll completely defoliate your garden, they'll wipe out a hayfield," he said. "They'll just destroy anything, anything that's green."
The bugs are also bad in Sanpete and Box Elder counties and the Uintah Basin.
Greenhalch said the hoppers seem to appear every seven years.
"That's the only thing I know for sure, that they're cyclical," he said. That means, though, this could be close to the end of the infestation.
