David Hughes, a biologist at Penn State University, shared a video of locusts swarming over Kenya.
According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (UN FAO), the latest locust plague in the country may be the worst in 70 years.
.@FAO survey on shores Lake Turkana (Northern Kenya) to assess swarm. These are yellow and of life adults mating pic.twitter.com/NY83z8zUk9
— David Hughes (@zombieantguy) February 22, 2020
Moreover, scientists say that the current swarms of locusts in Kenya are unlikely to die out soon since their eggs will hatch in March and April, creating a "second round of invasion".
Locusts often devour crops which can worsen the food security situation in the region and leave people without bread.
On Lake Turkana, Kenya today. pic.twitter.com/nr2ywclLTd
— David Hughes (@zombieantguy) February 21, 2020
Biologists have been trying to improve their prediction methods so that people could be ready to use chemical insecticides against locusts before they start swarming. But since these species inhabit millions of square miles of land in Africa and in the Middle East, such predictions are extremely challenging.