Is the Eastern US going to have a "Cicada" Spring?

[Maxmars]

From ScienceLine: Don’t freak out, but the cicadas are coming — lots of them
Subtitled: Billions will likely emerge across the eastern half of the US this spring, but climate change is a wild card



Oh, I remember the last time!  By coincidence, I moved back to the area where my entire life had been 'encrusted' with cicadas.  Wherever you could cast your eyes, cicadas could be seen in abundance... literally like a wallpaper over the telephone poles, ann on every building surface.  I kind of found it 'funny' until the noise nearly drove me mad.  

 Although the author treats us to the obligatory doctrine of these last few years, by opening with recipe ideas... there is some interesting information within NOT trying to 'sell' us on the 'joy' of eating bugs.

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... for the first time since 1803, two broods of periodical cicadas will emerge at the same time in the Eastern U.S. 

The broods, which are groups of cicadas in a particular region that emerge together, won’t overlap — except possibly in a small sliver in northern Illinois. But residents across much of the East can still expect to see “millions per acre” starting in late April or early May, says John Cooley, who studies cicadas at the University of Connecticut. “You won’t be able to avoid these,” he says.

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Further on, the tell us that when the ground temperature reaches about 64 degrees (F) they will begin to tunnel upward from underground, where they have been maturing for a decade and a half or so.

The article has a particularly strong "save the Earth," "manmade climate change," and "bugs are great protein!" vibe.  But despite that affliction it is worth reading.

[Maxmars]

ARS Technica has joined the news cycle on this...

The entire state of Illinois is going to be crawling with cicadas
 

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Brace yourselves, Illinoisans: A truly shocking number of cicadas are about to live, make sweet love, and die in a tree near you. Two broods of periodical cicadas—Brood XIX on a 13-year cycle and Brood XIII on a 17-year cycle—are slated to emerge together in central Illinois this summer for the first time in over two centuries. To most humans, they’re an ephemeral spectacle and an ear-splitting nuisance, and then they’re gone. To many other Midwestern animals, plants, and microbes, they’re a rare feast, bringing new life to forests long past their death.

From Nebraska to New York, 15 broods of periodical cicadas grow underground, quietly sipping watery sap from tree roots. After 13 or 17 years (depending on the brood), countless inch-long adults dig themselves out in sync, crawling out of the ground en masse for a monthlong summer orgy. After mating, they lay eggs in forest trees and die, leaving their tree-born babies to fall to the forest floor and begin the cycle anew. Cicadas don’t fly far from their birthplace, so each brood occupies a distinct patch of the US. “They form a mosaic on the landscape,” says Chris Simon, senior research scientist in ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Connecticut.

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"Mosaic on the landscape" is a very apt image... 

[Nikita]

From ScienceLine: Don’t freak out, but the cicadas are coming — lots of them
Subtitled: Billions will likely emerge across the eastern half of the US this spring, but climate change is a wild card

[Image: https://scienceline.org/wp-content/uploa...8x1536.jpg]

Oh, I remember the last time!  By coincidence, I moved back to the area where my entire life had been 'encrusted' with cicadas.  Wherever you could cast your eyes, cicadas could be seen in abundance... literally like a wallpaper over the telephone poles, ann on every building surface.  I kind of found it 'funny' until the noise nearly drove me mad.  

 Although the author treats us to the obligatory doctrine of these last few years, by opening with recipe ideas... there is some interesting information within NOT trying to 'sell' us on the 'joy' of eating bugs.

---

... for the first time since 1803, two broods of periodical cicadas will emerge at the same time in the Eastern U.S. 

The broods, which are groups of cicadas in a particular region that emerge together, won’t overlap — except possibly in a small sliver in northern Illinois. But residents across much of the East can still expect to see “millions per acre” starting in late April or early May, says John Cooley, who studies cicadas at the University of Connecticut. “You won’t be able to avoid these,” he says.

---

 
Further on, the tell us that when the ground temperature reaches about 64 degrees (F) they will begin to tunnel upward from underground, where they have been maturing for a decade and a half or so.

The article has a particularly strong "save the Earth," "manmade climate change," and "bugs are great protein!" vibe.  But despite that affliction it is worth reading.

So, since two broods are maturing at once....Double your Pleasure, Double your Noise Level ????
​​​​​​​

[SnrRog]

I don't know. I've been paying attention to the '17 year locusts' since 1970, I was 13. My brother ⅞was 17. We picked them up by their wings and smashed them to the ground, there were so many of them, it was hard to sit outside and have a conversation, the bugs were so loud!
I have lived in the same area all of my life, Lehigb Valley, Pa. Each 17 years, they became less and less, and in 2021, I MAY have heard a few, and I sit outside pretty much every night from spring to early winter.
In 2021 there was an article in The Morning Call (daily paper) about it, but it never happened. I don't know any reasons for it.

SnrRog

[Maxmars]

I don't know. I've been paying attention to the '17 year locusts' since 1970, I was 13. My brother ⅞was 17. We picked them up by their wings and smashed them to the ground, there were so many of them, it was hard to sit outside and have a conversation, the bugs were so loud!
I have lived in the same area all of my life, Lehigb Valley, Pa. Each 17 years, they became less and less, and in 2021, I MAY have heard a few, and I sit outside pretty much every night from spring to early winter.
In 2021 there was an article in The Morning Call (daily paper) about it, but it never happened. I don't know any reasons for it.

SnrRog

Actually, I too experienced the "big warning" with nothing happening... I wouldn't call it a 'disappointment" exactly, since the nerve-racking endless whining noise was something I wasn't ever 'looking forward to."  I think they are somehow always 'surprised' when it comes to cicadas.  Perhaps this coincidental double emergence won't happen this time... I won't complain.

[Nerb]

.....it was hard to sit outside and have a conversation, the bugs were so loud!

Same for bugs in Glastonbury I imagine when a pop-up concert decends on them from out of the blue.

[argentus]

I am one of the few people you know who are immune to the sound of Cicadas.   I am immune to it, because -- due to profound hearing damage -- I hear that sound all the time.   24/7.   I don't always focus on it.   It used to threaten to drive me mad, and then I just shifted and got past it.    I can even get into a meditative state and focus on the sound and make it go up or down in pitch.   I imagine that has to do with blood pressure, but I really don't know for certain.   

I feel bad for those folk who will suffer from hearing the little sonsabitches, because I know it can drive a person mad with the relentless high-pitched ssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss.   

What I have read is that we are all enterining into a "double-brood" event , wherein the two cycles -- 13-year and 17-year -- will overlap.  That sounds like it will be a bad time for everyone who has to suffer it.  Billions of cicadas will emerge in rare 2024 double-brood event (nbcnews.com)

We will get through this.   When I first had profound hearing damage, I learned to meditate to calm the noise.   I learned  to drown out the noise.   My Darlin' uses earplugs when such things happen.   I wish you all well.   It is a  temporary situation.   Don't let it drive you crazy.  I have found in the past that making a bigger noise blocks it out.  

We who are about to ROCK salute you.