God promised to send “hornets” before Israel to help drive the Canaanites out of the Promised Land. He plagued them with civil wars and difficult times. The Israelites were able to take down town after town. The Canaanite’ difficulties made the conquest possible.

Hazor

Even though God had given them land, other people were living there, too. These people didn’t know God and they did terrible things. So, to get their attention, God would send nations to conquer the Israelites. The Israelites would cry out to God for help and then God would send a judge to save them.

Joshua

Each time, Pharaoh promises to free the Israelites, but reverses his decision when the plague is lifted — until the last one. The plagues are: water turning to blood, frogs, lice, flies, livestock pestilence, boils, hail, locusts, darkness and the killing of firstborn children.

In II Sam. 24:15, God sends a pestilence that kills 70,000 Israelites because of David’s ill-conceived census. Jesus says in Luke 21:11 that there will be plagues. Both Ezekiel and Jeremiah speak of God sending plagues, for example, in Ezek.

Because Pharaoh refused to set the Israelites free, God decided to punish him, sending ten plagues on to Egypt. These included: The Plague of Blood.

10 plagues

Now, of the ten plagues, the eighth one was that of locusts. Moses warned the Pharaoh that God will send so many locusts that they will “cover each and every tree of the land and eat all that is there to be eaten”. Every time the Pharaoh refused, a fresh plague was inflicted upon his kingdom.

Do Locusts Bite People? Locusts do not bite people like mosquitoes or ticks since locusts eat plants. While it is unlikely that locusts would bite, they might nibble on someone without breaking the skin or pinch someone to help defend themselves.

1986

Metarhizium anisopliae

about three to five months

Locusts can be eaten by spiders, birds, lizards and desert foxes. The birds can eat so many that they become too heavy to fly off.

Locust bird, any of various African birds that eat grasshoppers and locusts, especially the black-winged pratincole (see pratincole). In India the rose-coloured starling is called locust bird.

Locusts are edible insects. Several cultures throughout the world consume insects, and locusts are considered a delicacy and eaten in many African, Middle Eastern, and Asian countries. They have been used as food throughout history. They can be cooked in many ways, but are often fried, smoked, or dried.

Locusts belong to the same family of insects as grasshoppers. Cicadas don’t cause the same level of destruction as locusts. Although large swarms of cicadas can damage young trees as they lay their eggs in branches, larger trees can usually withstand the cicadas.

Locusts and grasshoppers are the same in appearance, but locusts can exist in two different behavioural states (solitary and gregarious), whereas most grasshoppers do not. When the population density is low, locusts behave as individuals, much like grasshoppers.

What makes harmless little green grasshoppers turn into brown, crop-chomping clouds of swarming locusts? Serotonin, according to a study published this week in Science. It took just two to three hours for timid grasshoppers in a lab to morph into gregarious locusts after they were injected with serotonin.

COMPLETE METAMORPHOSIS They lay an egg on a leaf and the egg hatches into a larva (or caterpillar) which does not look like the adult butterfly. The caterpillar grows and turns into a pupa (which is sometimes called a chrysalis).

Fueling the locusts’ destruction is a bounty of vegetation following unusually heavy rains. All that food means the landscape can support a huge number of rapidly breeding insects. Farmers throughout East Africa now face food shortages, as the plague consumes both crops in the field and in storage.

The desert locust is potentially the most dangerous of the locust pests because of the ability of swarms to fly rapidly across great distances. The major desert locust upsurge in 2004–05 caused significant crop losses in West Africa and diminished food security in the region.

From biblical times to the present day, locusts have posed a devastating threat. Since last year, huge swarms have laid waste to crops in several African countries.

How Do You Get Rid of Locusts?

1. Protecting valuable shrubs and garden plants with insect mesh or cloth that is not green because green colors tend to attract locusts.
2. Removing locusts by handpicking them off plants.