Joe wrote:
On 05/29/2004 12:52 PM, Bob S. said:
In the Spring the media played up the coming swarm of cicadas(17 year
locusts), particularly in the Ohio River basin of the USA. Has the
hatch been as bad as predicted? Have they caused any damage to your
gardens or to any pets from eating them? Or was the media hype a
bust?


I'm in southern Indiana, which seems to be the epicenter (or at least one
epicenter). We have tons. They love our dogwood tree. Basically, the only
damage they are doing, nowt hat they are laying eggs, is to small tree
branches. Some small trees will have problems, since the cuts they make
cam interrupt the flow of sap in the branches, so people with small new
trees have them covered with netting, but older trees are just losing a
few branches. They will bounce back just fine (a good pruning won't hurt
them that much).

It is fun to watch people freak out when they fly up or land on them.
Cicadas won't hurt people - they dont bite or sting - but they freak out
just because they have beady red eyes.


As for the hype, I think things are about what was predicted here. some
parts of town hardly have any (where there is new construction, where
there has been lots of grading, where large trees didn't exist 17 years
ago), and others, like our neighborhood, are covered. It is saving money
on birdfood, since the birds, chipmunks and squirrels are all eating the
cicadas.

Meagan