Are you ready for Brood 19?

[chunkramwell]

One of the rarest, and perhaps most irritating, natural phenomena has begun across the South: the emergence of the Great Southern Brood.  The brood — millions of plant-munching insects called cicadas — is finally crawling to the surface after 13 years underground. The cicadas will spend a few weeks mating and laying eggs. Then they'll all die.  In middle Georgia, the emergence is under way and the air is alive with an unending drone of mating calls, 24 hours a day. "We've been humming here for a couple weeks now," said Carolyn Johnson of the Piedmont National Wildlife Refuge, just north of Macon, Ga.  Known as Brood 19, these cicadas crawl above ground every 13 years. They live in about a dozen states in the Southeast and Midwest and can be found as far north as Missouri and Illinois.  The brood is harmless, except to one's peace of mind. They make a constant electric hum that Kevin Kramer, of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources in central Georgia, likens to a muffled burglar alarm.

"We hear them every day," Kramer told OurAmazingPlanet. "You can't ignore it."

http://www.ouramazingplanet.com/great-southern-brood-110503-1474/

[funk51]

we have them in several varieties in pennsylvania the 7 year and 14 year kind. one year there was so many they actually stopped a train really.

[chunkramwell]

Stopped a train? Like superman or something?

They've not made it up to my house yet, but I'm going to cry if they wreck my garden.

[bradistani]

can you imagine walking through those woods and hearing that, being totally unaware whats making the sound.

we don't shit like that over here. i sometimes wonder if crickets are as loud in real life, as they are when heard on a night scene in a movie ??

[chunkramwell]

can you imagine walking through those woods and hearing that, being totally unaware whats making the sound.

we don't shit like that over here. i sometimes wonder if crickets are as loud in real life, as they are when heard on a night scene in a movie ??

Some of them are loud little bastards, I had one hiding in my house for a few days, I barely got to sleep.

[funk51]

Stopped a train? Like superman or something?

They've not made it up to my house yet, but I'm going to cry if they wreck my garden.

there were that many on the tracks that when train ran over them their innards were all over the rails causing the train to stop due to lack of traction.