Not sure if this fits in here, just stumbled upon: »Big brood of cicadas set to emerge from soil for first time since 2004« 🦗

[Artichoke Lover]

I’m disappointed we won’t get to see this one here. We will get a swarm here in 2024.

 

[WannaBeHillBilly]

Sorry meant to add it and forgot. Here it is. https://www.cicadamania.com/cicadas/periodical-cicada-brood-x-10-will-emerge-in-15-states-in-2021/

Looks like some of the counties around Kanawha will get some cicadas but we won't get them. Maybe a few. Poor Blanca! Maybe i take her for a field-trip…

 

[TooCheep]

I am in IN, I hope we get a lot (plump birds for fall harvest.)

I expect so. The feed bill should be down for that month or so.

Yep! But those are the annual cicadas. What's coming up this spring are the 17 year cicadas, they emerge only every 17 years.

"Annual" cicadas are actually on an 8 year cycle. They just have some mature every year. The 17 year group is much larger and come out all in the same year and overwhelm any predators by sheer numbers.

We are supposed to get locus this year to (can't wait)

They are actually the same thing. The 17 year cicadas are actually sometimes called "locusts", though they really aren't. Locusts eat all green plant matter that they can find and look like grasshoppers. Cicadas actually live 99% of their life in the soil and only come out for a short time to mate, lay eggs and die. They don't eat anything while in this adult form, but they do lay their eggs into the thin branches of trees. This often kills that end of the branches. Established trees generally survive. Young trees can be killed.

It's a bad year to be planting new/young trees and shrubs... at least before the cicada storm has passed (roughly mid-April to mid-May).

 

[Bigtom Turkey]

I am planting some bushes im my chicken yard....it will be fun to see the chickens picking off and eating them.