By GREG ANSLEY
CANBERRA - The grainbelt city of Dubbo, 420km northwest of Sydney, is this week reeling from an invasion of plague locusts that has coated buildings, swarmed across parks and carpeted streets.
Raised by heavy rain from the ground where their eggs had lain dormant through the worst drought in
a century, the locusts have swarmed down from southern Queensland in their tens of millions.
No one knows how long they will infest the city of 26,000 and the surrounding farmland, but so long as they stay the locusts will strip crops, grass and trees, and invade almost every aspect of life in Dubbo.
Walking in the streets means a constant battering from flying insects and navigating around thousands of bodies on the footpaths, air-conditioners have to be cleared continually, and drivers need to constantly clean windscreens.
Locust plagues develop when rain prompts eggs to hatch into swarms of up to 50 million insects that can cover 25 sq km and move 500km in a night.
The Australian Plague Locust Commission estimates a swarm covering just one square kilometre can eat 10 tonnes of crops in a day.
