Meaning

noun warm-water lobsters without claws; those from Australia and South Africa usually marketed as frozen tails; caught also in Florida and California

noun tiny lobster-like crustaceans usually boiled briefly

noun small freshwater decapod crustacean that resembles a lobster

originAlteration (by folk etymological influence of fish) of Middle English crevis (whence modern dialectal crevis), from Old French crevice ("crayfish"; > Modern French: écrevisse), from Frankish *krebitja (“crayfish”), diminutive of Frankish *krebit (“crab”), from Proto-Germanic *krabitaz (“crab, cancer”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *gerbʰ-, *grebʰ- (“to scratch, crawl”), or from a substrate…

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0