> So we end up with chemicals for things like aphids when ants will eat them all up for you. The ants species I know of "milk" aphids for their sugary excretio

> So we end up with chemicals for things like aphids when ants will eat them all up for you. The ants species I know of "milk" aphids for their sugary excretion, and as a counter service, protect aphids from their predators (such as ladybugs). It's... complicated. I agree with you that chemicals shouldn't be the first thing to reach for. It's interesting to try to find out how we got into this situation in the first place. The book Seeing like a State (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seeing_Like_a_State https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seeing_Like_a_State) has some interesting (but opiniated, in my opinion) notes on disastrous (on many axes - socially, economically, ecologically, ...) modernist agricultural reform programs that took place in Tanzania, Kenya and Ethiopia in the second half of the 20th century — a region much affected by these locust clouds.