17-year Cicada

[emon87]

The 17-year cicada is scheduled to emerge on tuesday in northern Illinois.

Wiki on 17-year Cicada

Anyone experienced one of these before? Is it really noticeable in the city? Are they gross? Should I barricade myself indoors?

[philr]

we had them in cinci a few years back - it is wild, they are sooooooo loud. The noise level varies from place to place, there is less noise in areas where the gound has been turned over in the last 17 years (i.e. new housing developments) but in undisturbed area they will be everywhere.

[punkass]

we had them awhile back in baltimore. they are loud as all hell, and they were everywhere in the city. They're harmless, but you will step on them and they will cover everything.

[Nonfiction]

[ QUOTE ]
we had them awhile back in baltimore. they are loud as all hell, and they were everywhere in the city. They're harmless, but you will step on them and they will cover everything.

[/ QUOTE ]
expect the noise all day, and LOTS of dead ones all over the place. Otherwise, business as usual, they aren't really getting in your way or anything just being loud as [censored] from trees.

[KDawg]

these buggers are loud. I live in wilmette right now, and I also remember the last time they were in illinois, they suck, actually, they're more annoying then anything else and they're always everywhere

[Poker is Rigged]

where in illinois are they supposed to be? im just outside of rockford and never heard of these before

[tuq]

I remember a couple of years ago there was an outbreak of these during a PGA Tour event, I think it was in Ohio. Good god were they loud, but it's not like people were staying home. I think all the carcasses and what not were kind of a hassle on the course though.

[signal]

When I lived in Pennsylvania we had these cicadas emerge. I think they were of the 13 year variety, however. I thought they were annoying, but at the same time it was kinda eerily beautiful. All the little corpses sprinkled haphazardly all over the ground; some were even 'frozen' on the bark of trees in mid-climb. And their red eyes....

At that time, I was in elementary school and we played lots of baseball and wiffleball so it kinda put a damper on that.

The most interesting thing about these insects is, to quote wikipedia,

[ QUOTE ]
The cicadas' survival strategy is simply to overwhelm predators by their sheer numbers, ensuring the survival of most of the individuals and thus of the species. It has been hypothesized that the emergence period of large prime numbers (13 and 17 years) is also a predatory avoidance strategy adopted to eliminate the possibility of potential predators receiving periodic population boosts by synchronizing their own generations to divisors of the cicada emergence period.

[/ QUOTE ]

People can speculate on the validity of this theorized correspondence between prime number year emergences and darwin natural selection of species, evolution, etc., and it may never be exactly proven, so to speak, but it is interesting that nature can develop such 'predator avoidance strategies'.

[ThaSaltCracka]

to be honest, OP find a way to "enjoy" something that happens once every 17 years. Thats pretty neat actually.

[tuq]

[ QUOTE ]
to be honest, OP find a way to "enjoy" something that happens once every 17 years. Thats pretty neat actually.

[/ QUOTE ]
Yeah. 80% of the guys on this board don't even get laid that often. Don't take it for granted.