desert locust

Desert locust main initial outbreak areas (modified from Lecoq, 2004 and Sword et al. 2010, the most recent outbreak occurred between June 2019 and February 2022.)In red, outbreak areas; light grey, recession area; light and dark grey together represent the invasion area (modified from Lecoq, 2004 and Sword et al. 2010). The desert locust (Schistocerca gregaria) is a species of locust in the grasshopper family, Acrididae. A periodically swarming, short-horned bird grasshopper, it is found primarily in the deserts and dry areas of northern and eastern Africa, Arabia, and southwest Asia. During population surge years, its range may extend north into parts of Southern Europe, Eastern Africa, and Northern India. The desert locust shows periodic changes in its body form and can change in response to environmental conditions over several generations. It begins life as a solitary, shorter-winged, highly fecund (producing enormous amounts of offspring), non-migratory form, to a gregarious, long-winged, and migratory phase in which it may travel long distances into new areas. Due to this traveling, it may join groups, thus, forming locust plagues. This involves invading new areas where it may consume all vegetation including valuable crops. Although at other times, it may live unnoticed in small numbers in various areas.

During plague years, when the desert locust does group with others, it can cause widespread damage to crops as it is highly mobile and feeds on large quantities of any kind of green vegetation. A typical swarm can be made up of 150 million locusts per square kilometre (390,000,000 per square mile) and fly in the direction of the prevailing wind, up to 150 km (93 mi) in one day. Even a very small, 1-square-kilometre (0.39 sq mi) locust swarm can eat the same amount of food in a day as about 35,000 people.