WORT 89.9FM Madison · Billions of Brood X Cicadas Emerge

The high-pitched buzzing of the Cicada’s mating call is one of the most familiar sounds of summer. We see, or mostly hear, small amounts of these large and noisy insects every year, but this year they are coming in the billions if not trillions. Having been underground for 17 years the phenomenon known as Brood X have been emerging from the ground on the East Coast and the Midwest shedding their exoskeletons, and performing their mating call.

Director of UW-Madison’s Insect Diagnostic Lab and insect identification and biology expert Patrick Liesch joins Friday Buzz host Jonathan Zarov to talk about this phenomenon.

 

(Image courtesy of UW-Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences on Flickr)