They can crawl almost anywhere and their chirping can be a nuisance, but the positive aspects of crickets may outweigh their negatives.

While there are many different types of crickets, the most common species found in Saskatchewan is the Fall Field Cricket. They are about an inch long, black in color, and have a very strong and distinctive chirp.

According to the Provincial Entomologist of the Ministry of Agriculture, Dr. James Tansey, crickets are very curious insects that can enter narrow spaces while searching for food.

“They are curious little animals and can squeeze their bodies into tight spaces and narrow holes. They will crawl into all kinds of structures,” Tansey explained.

Additionally, Tansey said, crickets have relatively large structures called mushroom bodies, which are the equivalent of the cerebral cortex that aids in cognition in vertebrates. This makes them relatively “smart” or “intelligent” insects.

“You can also see honeybees, which are a good example among other animals with large mushroom bodies,” Tansey said.

Crickets are omnivores that eat almost everything. They are known to feed on a variety of fruit plants, leaves, flowers, and seeds. They will also feed on other insects and even other crickets.

However, it is known that crickets feed on locusts and especially locust eggs, especially in the agricultural sector.

“They happily land in the nests where the locusts have laid their eggs, towards the end of the season, at this time of year, they dig up the eggs and happily eat those eggs,” Tansey commented.

Tansey added that he has seen crickets eat dead grasshoppers and crickets attack live grasshoppers. So while they can be a nuisance by getting into stored food and living in homes and garages while constantly chirping, they do have a positive agricultural impact.

Tansey warned that the crickets were causing direct damage to crops and needed to be controlled, although the reason for this was not understood. It is believed they may have resorted to eating other potential food sources and resorted to eating the crops.

Crickets can live in a wide variety of environments and can be found throughout the Great Plains. However, the Fall Field Cricket is a prairie animal.

From a crop pest perspective, it wasn’t as bad a year for locusts as initially predicted, Tansey said, and the insects are becoming less prominent as harvest begins.

Tansey has also received a number of calls from residents about Murder Hornets (officially known as Northern Giant Hornets). He said they have not been detected in Saskatchewan and that what people are seeing are doppelgangers. He explained that these are either late-stage yellow jacket queens that have begun to fly or banded hornets, which are large herbivorous wasps that are not interested in stinging humans and are more interested in laying eggs in diseased or dying trees.

If you see any of these species, Tansey recommends taking a photo of the animal while it’s still alive and submitting it to the Department of Agriculture, as there’s a good chance it’s a native species that’s important to the ecosystem.