# The Generation X Cicadas Are Coming! The Generation X Cicadas Are Coming! **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [April 21, 2004, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282 "2004-04-21T20:44:01Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![booklover](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/85f322/32.png) [@booklover](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/booklover)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2004, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/41 "2004-04-30T14:28:29Z")
FWIW, I ate one of the Brood X cicadas the last time they were around and it didn’t taste like much of anything to me—it was just a bit scratchy/tickly going down. Despite the fact that I’ve been a vegetarian for the last 13 years I’m tempted to try them again this time and see if they really do taste like asparagus. I’m psyched about them coming—I think I’ve seen a few of their holes recently, so I should have plenty in my neighborhood. ---
**Author:** ![JohnBckWLD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d6d6ee/32.png) [@JohnBckWLD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnBckWLD)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2004, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/42 "2004-04-30T15:34:45Z")
**Natural Enemy** : [The Cicanda Killer Wasp](http://ww2.lafayette.edu/~hollidac/cicadakillerhome.html) Not to be confused with the James Montgomery Exterminator Company; who pull up to your house in a Rolls Royce wearing pastel colored sweaters draped over their shoulders, dockers slacks and boat shoes. **Jacques Tiziou’s Pan Fried Cicada Recipe** : [On Real Player](http://cf.nbc5i.com/dfw/sh/videoplayer/video.cfm?id=3030167&owner=bal). From [NBC 5i’s _Food_ Section](http://www.nbc5i.com/food/3030182/detail.html) The link won’t work with a pop-up blocker - I personally would have preferred a vomit blocker. I’m still waiting for the first politician to propose the cicada surplus as an inexpensive way to feed Baltimore’s homeless population. **Home Gardeners Breathe a Sigh of Relief** : [Brood X Cicadas Will Cause Limited Damage To Trees, Yard Plants Across Eastern US](http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/03/040330085104.htm) Solution: Netting – with holes no greater than one-half inch across – securely over the top of vulnerable plants. With 1/2" netting, dolphins are safe - but if ducks get get tied up in 6-pack rings - I don’t know if cicada nets are safe for sparrows or hummingbirds. **Geographical Reach** : [According to the New York Times: “Not even Central Park is immune: Brood X was reported there in 1885”](http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/04/weekinreview/04foun.html?ex=1081659600&en=43e20e12f5c0ef34&ei=5062&partner=GOOGLE) If we see a repeat in 04, I guess the wooded area southwest of the sailing pond will become a ‘cruise-free zone’ this spring. That’s good news for the Parks Dept - picking up spent condoms with those ‘litter spike sticks’ has got to be a real bitch. ---
**Author:** ![lieu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c2a13f/32.png) [@lieu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lieu)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2004, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/43 "2004-04-30T16:38:16Z")
Anyone else picturing **Olentzero** on a motorcycle speeding through a swarm of locusts with mouth wide open like a basking shark through plankton? I am so looking forward to a follow-up report. ---
**Author:** ![Jinx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Jinx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jinx)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2004, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/44 "2004-04-30T16:57:08Z")
> [@JohnBckWLD](#): > > …they like to lay half dead on your back patio… Hmm, where do they lay half-live? 🙂 > [@](#): > > If you’re too young to recall the last swarm - or if you’ve moved to the east coast after the Spring of 1987 - You’re in for either a rare treat - or a big nuisance - depending on your perspective. Some say I’ve been blessed. I lived on the East Coast (Mid-Atlantic) all my life. I was in the heart of Philly in 1987, never saw a bug even walking around a lush, tree-lined campus in University City. Prior to that, I was just 3 years old in 1970 with no bad memories of these bugs at all. Now, my employment involves pounding the pavement in DC (away from the Mall area). I wonder if I’ll see much. Back home in the 'burbs, my development was built right on the '87-88 border. Some say we won’t see much there, either…being a new development & surrounded by farmland with minimal nearby forests. Hmm… My older sisters, however, have been scarred (and scared) for life! Now, if only something important like Halley’s comet or a total solar eclipse over this area came as often! But oh no! Instead,we get these pellets of flying protoplasm! 😉 - Jinx ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2004, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/45 "2004-04-30T18:05:41Z")
> [@lieu](#): > > Anyone else picturing **Olentzero** on a motorcycle speeding through a swarm of locusts with mouth wide open like a basking shark through plankton? :smack: You don’t eat 'em as fully formed adults, you eat 'em (after a small amount of preparation) after they’ve just emerged from the ground and before their exoskeletons have hardened. Makes me wonder when **booklover** got at one. ---
**Author:** ![Crescent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e99b99/32.png) [@Crescent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Crescent)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2004, 1:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/46 "2004-05-01T01:34:21Z")
I remember the 1970 horde, we had just moved to a farm in southern York County, PA from a very suburban area near Philly. Ugh… they were awful, noisy and everywhere. I looked on that map and we’re right in the thick of it for this brood. Gee… something to look forward to. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2004, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/47 "2004-05-01T02:52:35Z")
I was a kid in northern VA in 1962 when Brood II was around. They were _everywhere_. I was a teenager in northern VA in 1970 when Brood X should have been there. Nothing. I was living in northern VA in 1979, just a few miles from where I grew up, when Brood II should have reappeared. Nothing. Sure, these guys are supposed to show up, but I’m less than convinced of their supposed reliability. ---
**Author:** ![Never\_to\_be\_Queen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/e9c0ed/32.png) [@Never\_to\_be\_Queen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Never_to_be_Queen)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2004, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/48 "2004-05-01T03:08:38Z")
> [@Lissa](#): > > Around here, they’re looked forward to eagerly by the older folks. They always discuss the last “Big Locust” at exhaustive length, and gleefully predict that the “signs” point to a swarm on par with a Biblical plauge. Just what these “signs” are, I cannot say. (I imagine it’s something along the lines of “signs” like predicting the severity of the coming winter by the size of the black stripe on “wooly worms.”) Hurray for the Seventeen Year Locust! I came to visit my grandparents in Southwestern Virginia for the last big swarm; now I live here. It was in the newspaper last time of how the cicadas had a “W” on their wings for war. This time, they are supposed to have a “P” for peace. Those are pretty good signs, don’t you think? 😉 The last summer they came I enjoyed collecting the shells and filling large mason jars with them. JohnBckWLD: About the big scary wasp: :eek: That wasp in the picture was picking up a cicada! It said farther down the page they can both bite and sting! :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Hal\_Briston](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a9a28c/32.png) [@Hal\_Briston](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hal_Briston)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2004, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/49 "2004-05-01T14:07:33Z")
A neat swarm pic is part of [this story](http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/afp/us_environment_insects). Also, the AP says [“don’t let Fido have a flying snack!”](http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040429/ap_on_re_us/cicadas_pets_1) ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [May 1, 2004, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/50 "2004-05-01T21:36:01Z")
I planted a tulip tree in my yard last week. This morning’s Indianapolis Star had a big feature on cicadas. It said “delay planting trees until late June.” Thanks a lot. It did say, though, that I could protect my tender young tree by wrapping it in cheesecloth. Cicadas, you see, split the bark of end shoots to lay eggs within. The shoot then dies. [www.indystar.com](http://www.indystar.com) I once thought there must be thousands of cicadas in each tree to make that much racket. I have found, though, and nudged individuals. Each bug twirrs as loudly as an alarm clock. Yow. What I thought was a hundred was…maybe half a dozen. I heard a bug guy on the radio replicate a cicada call. It’s two notes. You whistle the higher one while vocalizing the lower one. I’ll let you musicians work it out. ---
**Author:** ![Alan\_Smithee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/2acd7d/32.png) [@Alan\_Smithee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan_Smithee)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2004, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/51 "2004-05-02T00:54:05Z")
I’m so pumped! When the heck are they supposed to get here? BTW, a quick Google search pulled up [this](http://www.urhome.umd.edu/newsdesk/pdf/cicada%20recipes.PDF) tasty morsel. ---
**Author:** ![Largo62](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/45deac/32.png) [@Largo62](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Largo62)\ **Post date:** [May 2, 2004, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/52 "2004-05-02T01:16:35Z")
> [@JohnBckWLD](#): > > (I kinda like the sound - especially in the morning. It kinda says love is in the air.) Sweet young thing: Isn’t that romantic? Just listen to the singing of all those cicadas! Dirty old man (leering): Those aren’t cicadas, my dear. Those are zippers! 😃 I live in California myself, so I’ve never experienced the cicada infestation. But I have a friend in Cincinnati who says she expects the swarms will keep her off her new deck. All sounds kinda creepy to me. ---
**Author:** ![Hal\_Briston](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a9a28c/32.png) [@Hal\_Briston](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hal_Briston)\ **Post date:** [May 11, 2004, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/53 "2004-05-11T18:38:20Z")
They’ve emerged! I was just outside having a smoke here at work in Princeton, NJ, when one of these suckers just buzzed by my head and thwacked himself into a wall. They have arrived! Found a pretty damn [cool site](http://www.cicadamania.com/) about them as well. ---
**Author:** ![JohnBckWLD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d6d6ee/32.png) [@JohnBckWLD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnBckWLD)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/54 "2004-05-12T18:23:30Z")
> [@Hal Briston](#): > > They’ve emerged!.. > Found a pretty damn [cool site](http://www.cicadamania.com/) about them as well. Thanks for the update and the link Mr. Briston. Those pics are cool…almost like a scene out of Starship Troopers. _It’s an evil planet, it’s a bug planet._ ---
**Author:** ![BiblioCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed8c4c/32.png) [@BiblioCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BiblioCat)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/55 "2004-05-12T18:46:16Z")
> [@Hal Briston](#): > > They’ve emerged! > > I was just outside having a smoke here at work in Princeton, NJ, when one of these suckers just buzzed by my head and thwacked himself into a wall. They have arrived! They’re out here in Baltimore, too. I haven’t seen too many at home, but they’re all over the freaking place at work. The damn things are nasty. And they’re just getting started. ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/56 "2004-05-12T19:19:16Z")
Arrrrrgh! Where?! WHERE?! I don’t see 'em, I don’t hear 'em, and they say they’ve emerged in DC already. WHERE ARE THE LITTLE BASTARDS?! I’m _hungry_. ---
**Author:** ![GingerOfTheNorth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/cdc98d/32.png) [@GingerOfTheNorth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GingerOfTheNorth)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/57 "2004-05-12T19:55:40Z")
I have yet to see or hear any. I’m in Dundalk, MD (south of/part of Baltimore). ---
**Author:** ![Neurotik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/91b2a8/32.png) [@Neurotik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neurotik)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/58 "2004-05-12T20:09:51Z")
Out here in Arlington (Ballston), I saw 5-6 this morning in my neighborhood when I walked to work. I picked one up, but it didn’t shriek. I was very much disappointed. ---
**Author:** ![matt\_mcl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7ab992/32.png) [@matt\_mcl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/matt_mcl)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/59 "2004-05-12T20:12:06Z")
My attention has been recently focussed Upon the seventeen-year locust. This is the year When the seventeen-year locusts are here, Which is the chief reason my attention has been focussed] Upon the seventeen-year locust. Overhead, underfoot, they abound, And they have been seventeen years in the ground, For seventeen years they were immune to politics and class war and capital taunts and labor taunts, And now they have come out like billions of insect debutantes, Because they think that after such a long wait, Why they are entitled to a rich and handsome mate, But like many another hopeful debutante they have been hoaxed and hocus-pocussed, Because all they get is another seventeen-year locust. - Ogden Nash, “Locust-Lovers, Attention!” ---
**Author:** ![BiblioCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ed8c4c/32.png) [@BiblioCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BiblioCat)\ **Post date:** [May 12, 2004, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282/60 "2004-05-12T20:15:38Z")
I teach pre-school and we always make red ants out of three sections of an egg carton this time of year, but we decided to make cicadas this year instead. We painted them brown and gave them red eyes and wings. They’re kinda cute. On the playground, the kids were picking up the dried shells and putting them in their tote bags. Nice surprise for mom! :eek: [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming-the-generation-x-cicadas-are-coming/241282.md?page=4)