locust

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

• noun Any of various short-horned grasshoppers that sometimes migrate in immense swarms, devouring vegetation and crops.
• noun A cicada, especially a periodical cicada.
• noun Any of several trees of the pea family bearing long pods, especially the black locust, honey locust, and carob.
• noun The wood of any of these trees.

from The Century Dictionary.

• To devour and lay waste like locusts; ravage.
• noun A well-known tree of the United States, Robinia Pseudacacia, with thorny branches, delicate pinnate leaves, and dense clusters of white heavily scented flowers.
• noun The carob-tree, Ceratonia Siligua. See Ceratonia and carob.
• noun The wood of the locust-tree.
• noun A club or billy used by policemen: so called because commonly made of locust-wood.
• noun One of the orthopterous saltatorial insects of the family Acridiiæ, popularly known as grasshoppers, and more correctly called short-horned grasshoppers.
• noun An orthopterous saltatorial insect of the genus Locusta, family Locustidæ.
• noun A homopterous insect of the genus Cicada, family Cicadidæ, such as the harvest-fly, Cicada tibicon, and the seventeen-year locust, or periodical cicada, Cicada septendecim. See cut under Cicadidæ.
• noun A cockchafer; a beetle.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

• noun (Zoöl.) Any one of numerous species of long-winged, migratory, orthopterous insects, of the family Acrididæ, allied to the grasshoppers; esp., (Edipoda migratoria, syn. Pachytylus migratoria, and Acridium perigrinum, of Southern Europe, Asia, and Africa. In the United States the related species with similar habits are usually called grasshoppers. See grasshopper.
• noun (Zoöl.) a longicorn beetle (Cyllene robiniæ), which, in the larval state, bores holes in the wood of the locust tree. Its color is brownish black, barred with yellow. Called also locust borer.
• noun (Zoöl.) the rose-colored starling or pastor of India. See Pastor.
• noun (Zoöl.) an African bird; the beefeater.
• noun (Bot.) The locust tree. See Locust Tree (definition, note, and phrases).
• noun (Bot.) a commercial name for the sweet pod of the carob tree.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

• noun A type of grasshopper in the family Acrididae that flies in swarms and is very destructive to crops and other vegetation.
• noun A locust tree.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

• noun migratory grasshoppers of warm regions having short antennae
• noun hardwood from any of various locust trees
• noun any of various hardwood trees of the family Leguminosae