The desert locust is a periodically swarming, short-horned grasshopper from the family Acrididae. They are primarily found in northern and eastern Africa, Arabia, and southwest Asia. However, they can extend their reach south to Eastern Africa, and into southern Europe, as well as east into northern India. Seeing as these critters are widely regarded as a substantial agricultural pest, they are listed as Not Applicable by the IUCN. Their varying numbers are unknown.
First the Stats…
Scientific name: Schistocerca gregaria
Weight: Up to .07 ounce
Length: Up to 2.72 inches
Lifespan: Up to 6 months
Now on to the Facts!
1.) They tend to show periodic changes in their body form and can change in response to environmental conditions, over several generations, from a solitary, shorter-winged, highly fecund (fertile), non-migratory form into a gregarious, long-winged, & migratory phase wherein they can travel great distances into new regions.
2.) During certain years they can form locust plagues, invading new areas, where they often consume all vegetation including crops, and at other times, they may dwell virtually unnoticed in smaller numbers.
3.) Even a rather small, 0.39 square mile, locust swarm can consume the same amount of vegetation in a day as up to 35,000 people!
4.) Locusts vary from other grasshoppers in their ability to change from a solitary living form into gregarious, highly mobile, adult swarms & hopper bands, while their numbers and densities increase.
5.) Having up to 2 – 5 generations per year, these critters reproduce more or less based on the amount of seasonal rains in any given year. The more it rains, the more they reproduce.
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6.) Desert locusts are possibly the most significant of the locust pests because of the ability of swarms to fly quickly across vast distances. The major desert locust upsurge in 2004 – 2005 yielded enormous crop loss in West Africa and reduced food security throughout the region. The 2019 – 2021 plague caused similar losses in northeast Africa, the Near East, and into southwest Asia.
7.) These insects are thought to have originated in Africa and then speciated (develop into a new and distinct species in the course of evolution) in the New World after a dispersal event that took place approximately 6 – 7 million years ago.
Did you know…?
A typical swarm can be made up of up to 390,000,000 per square mile, and typically fly in the direction of the prevailing winds, up to 93 miles in 1 day!
8.) Their lifecycle consists of 3 stages: the egg, the nymph (known as a hopper), and the winged adult.
9.) The insemination process takes several hours and 1 insemination is enough to supply a number of clutches of eggs.
10.) Females produce an egg pod that houses up to 100 eggs.
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11.) Based on the temperature, the egg pod can hatch in as little as 2 weeks, but can be much longer.
12.) Nymphs undergo up to 5 instars (molts) before reaching the winged adult phase.
Did you know…?
As hoppers get more crowded, the close contact causes their hind legs to bump against one another. This interaction triggers a cascade of metabolic and behavioral changes that causes the insects to transform from the solitary to the swarming phase.
13.) Nymphs reach maturity in up to 4 weeks as long as the food supply and weather conditions are favorable but maturity may take as long as 6 months when food and weather are less optimal.
14.) Once mature, these insects turn yellow and the abdomens of the females start to swell with developing eggs.
15.) Desert locusts have a solitary phase and a gregarious phase, which is a kind of polyphenism (a single genotype develops into multiple distinct phenotypes). Solitary locusts, nymphs, and adults can act gregariously within a few hours of being placed in a crowd, while gregarious locusts need 1 or more generations to become solitary when reared separately.
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16.) The change from an innocuous, solitary insects to a voracious eating machine normally follows a period of drought. As soon as the rain falls and vegetation flourishes in major desert locust breeding regions.
17.) When the hoppers become gregarious, their coloration changes, their bodies become shorter, and they produce a pheromone that causes them to be attracted to each other
Did you know…?
These critters can fly from 62 – 124 miles in a day, and fly up to approximately 6,600 feet above sea level.
18.) After a few days, the hopper bands dissolve and those that escaped predation become solitary once again.
19.) They were even reported to have crossed the Atlantic Ocean from Africa to the Caribbean in 10 days during the 1987 – 1989 plague.
20.) Some swarms, or plagues, can be comprised of up to 100 billion locusts which carries a weight of up to 197,000 long tons or 220,000 short tons!
But wait, there’s still a bit more on the desert locust!
21.) The desert locust is likely the oldest and most dangerous migratory pest in the entire world.
22.) They feast on bark, flowers, fruit, leaves, seeds, shoots, stems. Practically all crops and noncrop plants are eaten. This includes banana plants, barley, cotton, date palms, fruit trees, maize, pasture grasses, pearl millet, rice, sorghum, sugarcane, vegetables, weeds, and carrion (dead animals).
Did you know…?
However, locust frass (poop) and dead bodies are rich in nutrients which are transferred to the soil via decomposition by micro-organisms and fungi, absorbed by plants, increasing net ecosystem productivity & ecosystem nutrient cycling through the quick mineralization rates of nitrogen and carbon.
23.) Desert locust control still depends primarily on pesticides. In the event of an invasion, the control operations are of such a massive scale that the products used can have serious side effects on human health, the environment, non-target organisms, and biodiversity as a whole.
24.) Crop and pasture losses can lead to severe food shortages as well as a large imbalance in food availability, large price fluctuations in markets, insufficient availability of grazing areas, and more.
25.) The other economic consequences that happen during harvest, such as cereals being contaminated with insect parts and having to be downgraded to feed grains that are sold at a much lower price.
But wait, there’s still a tad more on the desert locust!
26.) Farmers often try to scare locust swarms away from their fields by producing noise, burning tires, or various other methods. However, this tends to just shift the problem to neighboring farms, and locust swarms very quickly return to reinfect previously visited fields once the “threat” is gone.
27.) Biopesticides used include bacteria, fungi, neem extract, and pheromones. The effectiveness of most biopesticides equals that of conventional chemical pesticides, however 2 primary differences exist: biochemical and microbial. Biopesticides typically take longer to kill the insects, plant diseases, or weeds, usually between 2 – 10 days.
Did you know…?
Lending to the destructive history of locusts, they have been a representative of famine in many Middle Eastern cultures, and are seen in the movies The Bible (1966) and The Mummy (1999).
28.) A few of biological controls go by the names of Green Guard, Green Muscle, and NOVACRID. They are applied in the same way as chemical insecticides, but do not kill as fast. At recommended doses, the fungus can take up to 2 weeks to kill up to 90% of the locusts.
29.) They are preyed on by birds, lizards, parasitoid wasps, and beetles. But these predators can only do so much, and only affect the locusts while in the hopper stage.
30.) These critters have been identified as 1 of the kosher species of locusts mentioned in Leviticus 11:22 by several rabbinical authorities among the Middle Eastern Jewish communities.
Now a Short Desert Locust Video!
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Some source material acquired from: Wikipedia & IUCN
Photo credit: Joachim Frische
