Joel 1:10

"The field is laid waste, the land mourneth; for the grain is destroyed, the new wine is dried up, the oil languisheth. Be confounded, O ye husbandmen. Wail, O ye vinedressers, for the wheat and for the barley; for the harvest of the field is perished. The vine is withered, and the fig-tree languisheth; the pomegranate-tree, the palm-tree also, and the apple-tree, even all the trees of the field are withered: for joy is withered away from the sons of men."

This paragraph depicting the devastation of the locust scourge is as moving and dramatic a presentation as can be imagined. There is no need of help of any kind in understanding the full meaning of such a description; it is a classic. Something in it reminds us of that sorrowful and heart-moving speech delivered by Sir Winston Churchill at a low water mark of Great Britain's struggle against Hitler in World War II: "Singapore has fallen. The Prince of Wales is lost. The Repulse is at the bottom of the sea!" There is something of that same epic tragedy in Joel's wonderful words here. As Deane commented:

"The field is wasted; the ground mourns; the corn is wasted; the new wine is spoiled; the oil decays!" - What a scene of desolation! yet how briefly and forcibly depicted! We see it all; we want nothing more to present it to our eyes.[24]

Not merely the fruit-bearing trees, but "even all the trees" of the field had been denuded and left bare and white in the sun, with even the bark stripped off.

Pictures taken after a locust plague in 1915 show branches of trees completely devoid of bark and glistening white in the heat of the sun.[25]

A marvelous description of the locust plague is given in the National Geographic Magazine for August, 1969, under the title, "The Teeth of the Wind." A heavy locust flight actually darkens the sun and brings utter devastation in its wake.