Vadodara: Have you ever seen a sudden wave in a small insect that hit your face or body while driving a two-wheeled vehicle today? This pest leaves the stain throughout the four-wheeled windshield after hitting him.
This is an indication of a leaf lice outbreak that is being witnessed in Urban Gujarat.
Sap-sig-sucking insects that have not been seen last year have made it back in with the beginning of ‘Vasant’, spring.
The researchers say the outbreaks suddenly on leaf fleas in the city are due to many natural factors that support them.
“This is not an annual phenomenon.
Temperature fluctuations are the main reason behind this outbreak that we witnessed this year,” said Professor Pragna Parikh from the University of the University’s Zoological Department.
“We have seen sudden temperature fluctuations in the past few weeks.
After a few cold days, the level of mercury went bankrupt suddenly.
This has caused an outbreak,” he said.
An outbreak of leaf lice is a spring sign.
“Fleas leaves and other insects grow rapidly in the spring when plants at this time this year are very nutritious and have fewer defenses.
In urban areas, they eat ornament plants or flowering or even cut neat grass,” Parikh said.
However, what has changed is that the leaf lice population is not naturally controlled.
“Fleas leaves are often controlled by natural enemies such as beetles and ladybird lacewings.
But because urbanization, many plants such as calotropics (milkweeds or dhatura) almost disappear and hence the insect of natural biological controllers also decreases,” Parikh said.
Interestingly, the rapid growth of a flea number is because the species does not depend on sex for reproduction.
Fleas all women reproduce through partthenogenesis, with lay words: they don’t need their eggs to be fertilized by men.
“If all of these descendants live in the same place it will be crowded.
So, when a group starts too large, lice leaves take flights, spread to other leaves, trees or even further.
They are not a strong and very winding flyer, So much might perish, “he said.