Observations on Grasshoppers

2025 was a terrible grasshopper year here.

They are pretty bad again this year.  I planted a lot of small trees and piles and piles of different seeds earlier this year.  
In my faithful every other day hand watering I have been in an ideal situation to observe grasshopper preferred foods.

What they have eaten, while leaving neighboring plants alone:
Lemon balm, Itoh peonies, hollyhock seedlings, cucumber starts.

Maximillian sunflower has a category of its own.  They ate a young plant to the ground, leaving only a few stems.  Haven’t touched it since.

Blackberry also has its own category.  Some different plants have been eaten, some have not been touched.  Could be related to variety or location or both.

Plants they have taken a bite or two of, and may be about to obliterate:  nanking and choke cherries, elderberries, comfrey, plantain (plant, not the thing that looks like a banana)

Plants as yet untouched:  strawberries,
locust seedlings, both black and New Mexico, white mulberry seedlings (fruit comes in all colors, species is alba, it’s the kind silkworms eat and the leaves are high protein and edible.  Parsley, squash seedlings.

I will be adding to this list, and hopefully, others will also make contributions.  The object is to create a data base that will suggest possible trap crops.

It would also be fun if a few grasshopper resistant varieties emerged.