Cicadas invasion

When was it 2011, we had five different hatches(not the right word) including the 17 year.
For over a month maybe two,it was loud everywhere. The first hatches were loud enough but then they all overlapped.
I am not exaggerating one bit. We could not hear traffic or conversation outside. The train was a half mile a way. We could not her the trains.
I could not hear the riding lawn mower. I wear hearing protectin but I can still hear the mower real well.
All Spring and before there were swarms of birds not usually seen. They were building nests everywhere. The mailbox didn't get closed and it had a nest the next day, removed it and the mail box wasn't closed and there was another one building.
They built nest in the grills, of the truck an the car. The Paper Delivery Guy said he had to empty every box to put papers in, every day.
There were hordes of young Squirrels, and rabbits.
They knew the hatches were coming.
I saw on one occasion Robins stuffed with so many bugs they couldn't fly. One had one in his mouth and he was so stuffed if he had swallowed it he would have burst. The Resident Squirrels were fat a butterballs. the deer were stuffing themselves on them too as were Racoon and opossums and foxes, as I heard.
neighbors cattle were feasting on them too. Woods surround everyone here.
Of course it was the talk on the media and everyone had recipes and just swore they were good eating.
While some hatches ended, still had to mow and after the yall ended mowing was real chore. All those huge trees the Cicadas deposited their eggs at the unctions of leaf clusters. The yards and field including ours was ankl
e deep in leaves or more.
Our Neighbor had a big lawn much and vac towed by conventional riding mower.
If it hadn't been for him we may have never go the yard cleaned up.
All, of you northeast, of us a bout 300 miles are in for a time. Turn you radios up and learn to talk real loud.

It was in a movie made in about 1952 titled "THEM" starring future marshal Matt Dillon (Jim Arness) when I first heard the noises made by giant, radiation-enhanced killer ants. Pretty scary stuff for a 10-year-old kid.

A number of years later I heard that same noise when deep in the woods one day. It was an amazing flashback. It was then I discovered it wasn't ants making "that" noise. It was the cicadas coming out for their 17-year-cycle.

Maybe the ants make that noise too. The ones around my house are too small to tell.

Just make a camp fire - they don't like smoke either.

Few years ago we were stuck in slow traffic on an interstate - with no A/C in the truck, in July. Windows all down and rolling along more and more slowly. I heard this weird "noisy" noise. Couldn't identify it. We actually thought it might be our truck (and my DH is a mechanic, so not a complete idiot about funny vehicle sounds). We finally identified a swarm of bugs in the trees along the interstate. The noise would speed up as you rolled a little faster and also bounced off the guardrails in a strange way, so you really did think it was coming from your vehicle....

Anyway, we laughed at ourselves once we identified it as bugs. But it took us MILES LOL. But we didn't feel quite as stupid when we saw a big rig ahead of us stop and exit his rig (traffic was stopped at this point) and look all around his truck, under it, etc. to try and identify the noise as well :)

When we had them by our house they sounded like you were living under high tension lines. You could hear them with the doors/windows closed. But it was very area specific.

Back in the day there was a series of books written by a woman named Laura Ingels Wilder. They are commonly called the "Little House On The Prairie" series. (one of the books took place in a town called Walnut Grove which is only a few miles from me)

In one of her books she talks about a grasshopper invasion. She says the chewing noise the millions of grass hoppers made would drive people mad.

One day the grass hoppers started marching and all together marched the same direction. After doing this for a while the took to the air and they were so thick that they blocked out the sun. After they were gone not one green thing was left in their wake.

We are all lucky to live in this era when insects are not as bad as what they once were.

CavemanCharlie wrote:

dewey02 wrote:

CavemanCharlie wrote:
I've never experienced them and I'm slightly older then 16 . But, I don't think we have them in MN. Or, at least not around her. And, if we do then they are not that bad and I've never noticed them.

True, at least in Northern MN. But then we have the dreaded army worms that come around every 10 to 15 years. Their huge appetite for tree leaves make it look like winter during the summer (trees with no leaves on them) and it's not like we don't already have enough months of winter up here! :(

No Army Worms down here.

They were not to bad last year but, for a few years we had Chinese Lady Beatles by the billions around here.

Twin Cities here and we have had them in our yard. Not the large numbers. Ugly little critters and I don't mind the sound. Now if I heard them in the thousands I might feel different

Either Cicadas take turns on their 17 year cycle or other varieties are on a different cycle because we hear some every year just more some years. About 6 years ago we were camped close to where we ended up moving to last year (when we first fell in love with East TN), and they were deafening. In less than a minute after sundown the woods went silent, it was like a switch was thrown. Very peaceful sleep.

dewey02 wrote:

CavemanCharlie wrote:
I've never experienced them and I'm slightly older then 16 . But, I don't think we have them in MN. Or, at least not around her. And, if we do then they are not that bad and I've never noticed them.

True, at least in Northern MN. But then we have the dreaded army worms that come around every 10 to 15 years. Their huge appetite for tree leaves make it look like winter during the summer (trees with no leaves on them) and it's not like we don't already have enough months of winter up here! :(

No Army Worms down here.

They were not to bad last year but, for a few years we had Chinese Lady Beatles by the billions around here.

Couple of years ago I stayed at CG that had one of the biggest invasions they had seen.

It was just awful. Nothing pretty or nature like about it at all. The dead ones were several inches deep and all over the RV's your BBQ you name it and there were dead ones in or on it.

AND they were loud. Did I say loud? I mean REAL irritating loud. I think some people are confusing the sound of the crickets on a nice summer night. Cicadas DO NOT sound anything like that.

I left my CG stay there early just to get out of there! :B

End Of Days!!!!!!!!!