China has been a country with frequent locusts since ancient times, and the scope and extent of disasters are the highest in the world. Therefore, the study of locust plague and locust control in China in past dynasties has become one of the topics concerned by ancient and modern scholars. As early as the Ming and Qing dynasties, there were many far-reaching agricultural books on locust control, which had a preliminary scientific understanding and summary in locust habits, locust plague occurrence law and locust control technology. For example, Xu Guangqi, a famous scientist in Ming Dynasty, got a correct understanding of the occurrence season and breeding ground of ancient locust plague through the statistics and analysis of the locust plague before Ming Dynasty, which became an outstanding achievement in the study of ancient locust plague in China. After entering the 20th century, with the development of national economic construction, scholars of different professions in past dynasties devoted themselves to the study of locust plague and locust control in China, and achieved many remarkable results. Especially in the 1990s, in response to the "Decade of Disaster Reduction" proposed by the United Nations, the academic circles set off an upsurge of studying the science and history of disasters in China, and the study of the history of locust disasters became one of the hot spots, with many articles and treatises appearing. According to the author's preliminary statistics, more than one monograph 100 has been published since the 20th century, including more than 30 works on locust history. Throughout the research process in the past hundred years, there are three stages of development: from the early 20th century to the late 40s; 50 s to 70 s; Since the 1980s.

Research status from the beginning of 20th century to the end of 1940s.

At the beginning of the 20th century, with the introduction of modern western science, some scholars who returned from studying in the West, such as Wu Fuzhen, Zou, classified and distributed modern locusts, observed their life history and habits, predicted and prevented migratory locusts, and extended their research tentacles to historical materials of locusts in order to have a deeper understanding of the occurrence of locust disasters. Among them, the representative research results are: Records of Locust Disaster in China Literature (written in 1928 and published in English in 1938), Ancient Locust Catching Law by Li (Insect and Plant Diseases, Volume 1), and The Relationship between Drought and Locust Disaster in Jiangsu in Qing Dynasty. At the same time, some historians began to count the plague of locusts in their works. For example, The History of Famine in China (written by Deng Yunte, Commercial Press, 1937), regarded as the pioneering work of the history of famine in China, makes statistics on the number and frequency of natural disasters in China, including locust plague. Chen's List of Natural and Man-made Disasters in Past Dynasties in China (one of the series of National Jinan University, 1939) recorded 257 locust plagues. Among them, the number of locust plagues planned by Deng Jia is mostly quoted by later generations.

Research status in 1950s and 1970s.

The real research on the history of locusts began in the 1950s. The background is that large-scale chemical control of locusts in China is in full swing. At that time, many scholars sorted out and analyzed the historical data of locust plague in order to find out the occurrence law of locust plague more comprehensively. Cao Ji's Record Analysis of Locust Disasters in Past Dynasties (China Agricultural Research 1950, Vol. 1No.) discusses Hebei, Shandong, Henan, Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Anhui from 200 BC to 1 901year. Using the methods of quantitative statistics and comparative analysis, various relationship curves are drawn. This is an early attempt to use natural science methods to count ancient disasters, and it is also a method that researchers used more later. Guo Ke's "Research Achievements of Ancient Locusts in China" (Journal of Entomology, Vol.5, No.2, 1955) analyzes the achievements of controlling locusts in ancient China. The article "Preliminary Arrangement of Historical Records of Locust Disasters in Anhui Province" (Anhui Historical Newsletter No.2, 1959) compiled by the Natural Disaster Collection Section of Anhui Provincial Institute of Literature and History is an analysis of the records of locust disasters in the Statistical Table of Natural Disasters in Anhui Province in the Past Millennium. It is considered that the occurrence of locust disasters in this area is continuous and extensive, and there is a certain correlation between locust disasters and drought. In addition, Bai Qin's Records of Catching Locusts in Past Dynasties (Anhui Daily 196 1 August 17) and Zhao Yin's Another Contribution of Chen Zhenlong to Agriculture (Fujian Daily1961) are introduced.

At that time, some provincial and municipal cultural and historical museums and meteorological units also compiled historical materials of locusts or natural disasters including locusts, such as Historical Materials of Natural Disasters in Guangdong Province compiled by Guangdong Provincial Cultural and Historical Museum in 1970s (revised in 196 1 year and 1963) and Chronology of Natural Disasters in Hunan by Hunan Institute of History and Archaeology (Hunan People's Publishing House, 66) The National Meteorological Administration organized the collection of meteorological historical materials, and published the Historical Materials of Drought and Flood in North China and Northeast China in Recent 500 Years (Consolidated Edition) (1975), which was co-edited by the Central Meteorological Institute, the Meteorological Bureaus of ten provinces (cities, districts) in North China and Northeast China, and the Department of Geophysics of Peking University. Central weather bureau Research Institute and Shanghai, Jiangsu, Anhui, Zhejiang, Jiangxi and Fujian Meteorological Bureaus jointly compiled the climatic historical data of East China in the past 500 years (1978), and Wuhan Central Meteorological Observatory compiled the climatic historical data of Hubei Province in the past 500 years (1978), which also included a large number of locust disaster data.

Research status since 1980s.

After the reform and opening up, with the arrival of scientific spring and the strengthening of people's environmental awareness, especially the development of disaster reduction activities and the rise of disaster science, the study of ancient locust plague and locust control in China has been paid more and more attention. Scholars have invested a lot of energy in the research on the frequency and intensity of locust infestation and the prevention measures and methods, and the related research shows a trend of multi-angle, systematic, comprehensive and in-depth discussion, especially in the cross-application of multidisciplinary knowledge. In order to clearly show the research results of this period, the following are divided into five categories: comprehensive research, dating and regional research, locust control technology and locust culture, ancient locust control books research, and locust history data collation. Characteristics of locust plague in the Yellow River Basin

After the flood, serious droughts often occur in the Yellow River basin (especially in the middle and lower reaches). The alternating occurrence of floods and droughts has led to many large areas of wasteland or wasteland along the lake, coastal areas and flooded areas, which directly formed natural geographical conditions suitable for the occurrence and rampant of migratory locusts. The Yellow River flood locust area and Bohai Bay locust area below Zhengzhou are also directly formed by the overflow and diversion of the Yellow River, the change of waterway into the sea and the sediment deposition in the estuary. Therefore, from the distribution of the occurrence bases of Locusta migratoria manilensis in Huanghuai Plain in modern times, the reasons for its rampant occurrence in recent 300 years, and the data recorded in local county (prefecture) records, combined with the analysis of the changes of rivers in previous dynasties, it can be considered that the formation of the occurrence bases and locust areas of Locusta migratoria manilensis in this area is closely related to the changes of the Yellow River in previous dynasties. In addition, judging from the formation sequence of the occurrence base of Locusta migratoria manilensis in Huanghuai Plain, the delta locust area formed by the Yellow River in Haikou at present should be in a relatively primitive stage. Tracing back to the formation history of Huanghuai Plain, it is inferred that the most primitive place of occurrence of Locusta migratoria manilensis may be the ancient Yellow River alluvial fan belt from the northeast of Zhengzhou-Kaifeng to the south of Linqing-Yucheng. The formation of flood plain locust area is the second, and the formation of lakeside waterlogging locust area is relatively late. The great diversion of the Yellow River plays an obvious role in the formation of migratory locusts in waterlogging-prone areas and lakeside locust areas.

In addition to the coastal locust areas below Lijin, there are two main types of migratory locust areas in East Asia along the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River: flood plain locust areas (generally divided into upper, middle and lower beaches, and the middle beach area is the main place where migratory locusts occur) and old channels and flood locust areas of the Yellow River (flood areas of old channels and crevasses left by the diversion of the Yellow River). The discharge and water level of the Yellow River have a certain correlation with the beach area. Generally speaking, the occurrence of Locusta migratoria manilensis in the floodplain is greatly influenced by large discharge, rising water level and increasing inundation area of the floodplain. Effects of water filling period and water accumulation time on Locusta migratoria manilensis: the river overflowed in May and receded in June. Reduce the occurrence of summer locusts in that year. It was flooded in early and middle July and retreated in early and middle August, and the occurrence area of autumn locust was the smallest. Before the end of August, when the water is fed back, autumn locusts lay eggs with the retreating water, and summer locusts often occur in the coming year. In early and mid-September, at the peak of autumn locust spawning, Locusta migratoria manilensis concentrated in the high and old beaches that were not flooded, and a small area of high-density locust swarms often appeared in higher areas in the following year. If the flow of the Yellow River is small year after year, the area of beach water decreases and the occurrence area of Locusta migratoria manilensis increases; On the contrary, when most beaches are flooded for years, the occurrence of Locusta migratoria manilensis is lighter.

Because the Yellow River is cut off in summer and autumn (July-September) and spring and summer (February-June), this period is the development and breeding period of Locusta migratoria manilensis, and the cut-off directly affects the occurrence dynamics of Locusta migratoria manilensis in the Yellow River beaches of Henan, Shandong and other provinces. According to the investigation, during the 20 years when the Yellow River in Henan was cut off, the high density of 100 heads /m2 appeared in 15 years. From the analysis of the occurrence of locusts in 197 1 ~ 1997 in the past 27 years, except that the occurrence of 1985 ~ 1986 is not directly related to the Yellow River, the recurrence year of Locusta migratoria manilensis in the Yellow River basin is 17.

Characteristics of locust plague in pastoral areas

The total area of pastoral areas in China is 465,438+600,000 km2, accounting for 43% of the land area. The vast pastoral areas and farming-pastoral ecotone in the north and northwest of China are located in arid and semi-arid areas, with an annual precipitation of about 50-400 mm. Drought occurs frequently, widely and for a long time, which seriously affects the yield and quality of pasture. The vast grassland includes desert, semi-desert, desert grassland, typical grassland and mountain grassland meadow area. Due to the regional differences and vegetation types between grassland and meadow, the occurrence characteristics of locusts are obviously different from those in the agricultural areas of the Yellow River Basin in China. Its main characteristics are: many species (about 200 species, about 20 species can cause harm in the process of clearing), wide distribution (locusts are almost distributed in different types of four seasons grassland and farming-pastoral ecotone), high density (locusts with high density can occur in different types of grassland), wide and narrow feeding habits, different occurrence periods of dominant locust groups, and the ability of diffusion, migration and reproduction of some dominant locust groups such as Siberian locust, Italian locust and Asian migratory locust. Therefore, the disaster characteristics of grassland locusts are different from those in agricultural areas. The characteristics of locust plague in pastoral areas and agro-pastoral ecotone are often due to grassland degradation, desertification, overgrazing (livestock overload) and large-scale reclamation, which not only destroys the ecological balance of grassland ecosystem, but also leads to the rampant occurrence and harm of some locust populations (especially xerophytes). All these have seriously affected the development of grassland animal husbandry. Therefore, in the work of locust control, we should take the basic theory of ecology as the guidance, coordinate the structure and function of grassland ecosystem and maintain its dynamic balance as the guiding ideology, and continue to implement the policy of "reform and control simultaneously, eliminate locust damage" in order to realize grassland protection and sustainable development of agriculture and animal husbandry.