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Every 13 years periodical cicadas emerge from underground in late April or early May. Smaller cicadas come around every year but the 13 year periodical returns in masses. Commonly, the density is in the hundreds of thousands per acre. City folks are not usually bothered, the periodical prefers trees, bushes, shrubs and the country.
Why do they return every 13 years? To mate and die. And they are loud it can reach the 100-decible range from one love-starved bug. One male can mate several times and the female lays as many as 600 eggs.
It's really an amazing cycle of life, we live in the country and believe me they can make a lot of noise.
Read more: SOUTH CAROLINA | Cool? Yuck? Cicadas are back in SC this spring | The Herald - Rock Hill, SC (http://www.heraldonline.com/2011/01/16/2758125/cool-yuck-cicadas-are-back-in.html#ixzz1BFPF2Hj1 - broken link)
crap there goes my landscaping...anything you can do to protect your shrubs? We had them up North as well, but not in the multitude I am expecting down here.
crap there goes my landscaping...anything you can do to protect your shrubs? We had them up North as well, but not in the multitude I am expecting down here.
If you have shrubs or bushes that you feel might be susceptible to damage you can cover them. Home Depot, Lowe's and Wilson's sells covers. We've never had any damage they just return to mate. We have had lots of little dead bodies to clean up afterwards.
I thought they came in 17 year intervals, not 13??
Are we talking the BIG huge ones? When I first moved here a little over a year ago, I saw a dead one between 2 gasoline pumps that must have been about 4-5 inches in size, MUCH larger than the little 2" ones I'm used to seeing.
Everyone told me the bugs in the south were going to be bad. I've been here 16 months now, and I was just starting to think, "Eh, the bugs aren't any worse than living up north. In fact, we had almost NO mosquitos last summer so it's a pleasant change from up North."
Oops... I didn't see the link to the article which stated they are about 1 1/2" long. Thank goodness they're the small ones. But what are those HUGE ones? Do those come in masses at any regular interval?
We saw a couple of very large ones fly by at random last year, but I don't think I could handle them in masses.
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