(WKBN) — As spotted lanternflies are taking Ohio and other parts of the U.S. by storm, experts are working to find any potential benefits to the invasion and think they may have found one: as another food source for bees, especially with flowers suffering under recent drought conditions.

Jonathan Shields is the spotted lanternfly program manager at the Ohio Department of Agriculture. He says it's difficult to get accurate numbers on the spotted lanternfly populations, and the department bases the data on reported sightings.

"We are receiving quite a lot of reports from the public of spotted lanternfly, and we're seeing it in new areas where we haven't seen it in previous years," Shields said. "So based on that, we would definitely say spotted lanternfly is spreading in Ohio."

So far, ac

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