Brace? Heck, they can make jewelry out of their carcasses or dishes to eat with them... not really. I mean some people do, but I'm not one of them.

Here is a link that might be useful: laquered insect earrings.

CRAP! Time for them again huh? Won't even be able to go outside. Between the lady bug investation, the stink bug infestation and now the return of the 17 year cicadas, it's enough to make me consider moving.

I hate bugs!

Rob, maybe they'll turn up on Etsy this summer. :-)

Those bugs drive me crazy with all their noise. Cicadas must love humidity.

So glad we don't have to listen to them here in So Calif! My tinnitus sounds just like cicadas and that's bad enough. ugh.

Jodi-

I visited Maryland last summer and one of the first things to greet me was the novel noise of the cicadas. Those suckers are LOUD!!

Maybe we should stock up on ear plugs. No kidding.....like Jodi, I have tinnitus. I carry ear plugs with me everywhere, especially for music performances. The NBC article says the cicadas can produce rock-concert noise levels.

I can relate to Jodi's tinnitus...that is sort of like what mine sounds like too. In fact, since I live in the country, I thought I was hearing crickets for the longest time!

I guess I am the odd one here....I like hearing cicadas. I am fascinated that they spend 17 years in the ground. Now, I guess if we had them really bad just ever so often, I wouldn't like them so much, but to me, it is one of the sounds of summer.

Remember, there are several species of cicada ; not all are on a 17 year time clock.

The northeast states are the in the middle of the bull's eye this year. Does anyone from that area remember a big emergence in 1996? That's the last time for Brood II. Last year's Brood I was located in VA, WV, and TN. In 2014, Brood III will emerge in IA, IL, and MO.

There are some species that cycle every thirteen years and some every year. The sheer number of insects in some locations can be horrendous.

We have a pretty good population here every year. Just enough to comment on how loud they are but not so many that we can see a lot of tree damage.

rhizo I do! We had been living here for about 6 years. Our son, who was 14 at the time, was in the back yard on the riding mower. He was getting as close to the fruit trees as he could (less weed whacking that way) and bumped it with the mower deck. Ugh, man did he let out a yell, hundreds of them dropped on him when he shook the tree. It looked like a scene from a horror movie.

They are so loud here they actually completely drown out 18 wheelers horns, their jake brakes (is that the correct term) even trains. You can't talk to each other outside.

Boy am I ever dreading summer even more now. Sigh...

They were so bad here one time, it drowned out all other outside noises, it made it hard for animals to be wary of predators and to hear their fawns calling (we only knew that because our doe had had twins that year and ended up losing both of them to something.) Some friends had a baby and one of her middle names is Cicada. It was when three different cycles of cicadas all hatched out in the same summer, just horrible.

Maybe they'll take care of our stink bugs...Either that or drive them away with their noise.......

Yes, I wish the cicadas would feast on the stink bugs. What useless creatures they are!

I just love th sound of crickets in summer. They usually start up sometime in July and last through the early fall, the evening. It is a sound that says "summer" to me. I can't remember the sound of the cicadas, but I guess I'll get to hear them this year. I always find those casings of what I thought were cicadas on the fence or on the tree bark. They don't have wings, though.

Oh well. As long as they don't sting, bite or destroy vegetation, they don't bother me. I suppose if I have to walk over large numbers of them, my opinion will change!

I remember being horrified by the 17 yr. ones as a kid growing up in NE OH. They'd fall out of the trees and onto my head! Then, as an adult, I moved south ( NE FL, Houston, Central FL) and they're an annual way of life. It cracks me up to see how different dogs deal with them. The doxie mix (short legs) nudges them with his nose and backs off. The Rottie mix messes with them with her paws and does a lot of jumping backwards. After 25 yrs. in the south, they're just another nature sound.

Southern Illinois is also populated with cicadas, lots of them. Cicadas emerge every year in Illinois because there are more than one brood. The famous brood is the 17 yr cicada and there are more than one brood of 17 yr cicadas. Other broods exist that have a different schedule for example one brood has a 13 yr cycle. There are cicadas every year owing to multiple broods. The evenings and nights are noisy on the rare event when more than one brood hatches.

Farm folks welcomed the emergence of the cicada because a strong population of those insects indicated the environment was live and well. (Also, we lived in isolation from the world and entertainment was scarce. One welcomed natural events.)

Apparently some of them can do damage to trees and roots, especially fruit trees :-(

Here is a link that might be useful: Cicada tree damage

One advantage of living in Long Island NY, they are not coming here.

The nymphs feed in plant roots in the soil. The adult females cut slits into the epidermis of woody plants in order to lay eggs. In large numbers, these activities are damaging.

Bad timing for me, as we are doing our first attempt at grafting apple trees this year. Sounds like cicadas are the last thing a new fruit tree needs.

Also the old fruit trees......In 2009, 2010, and 2012 our apple crop was ruined by freezing temperatures in June. We were hoping for a good crop this year.