Chicago is Still Waiting on Its Cicadas, But Southern States Are Buzzing. Here’s What the Emergence Looks and Sounds Like Across the Country

Science & Nature

Chicago is Still Waiting on Its Cicadas, But Southern States Are Buzzing. Here’s What the Emergence Looks and Sounds Like Across the Country

Patty Wetli | May 10, 2024, 1:57 pm

Cicada Watch 2024 is reaching fever pitch in the Chicago region where Brood XIII periodical cicadas are expected to burst from the ground by the millions, any day now.

Yep, anyyyyy day now. Folks are keeping busy swathing trees in protective netting and scouring the ground for exit holes, and there’s even a Facebook group monitoring soil temperature — the cicada signal is 64 degrees.

Residents in Elmhurst are wrapping their young trees to protect them from cicadas. Female cicadas slice into tender branches to lay their eggs. (Nicole Cardos / WTTW News)

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In southern parts of the U.S., the massive Brood XIX began emerging weeks ago, creating quite the buzz.

People are grasping at all kinds of ways to describe the noise: Some say it sounds like sirens or a factory or a weed eater, others have compared it to a theremin or the sound effect for old-time movie alien spaceships.

Basically, it’s as loud as promised.

For the latest sightings, check the Cicada Safari app, and be sure to contribute your own images. Here’s a quick look around the country at what’s about to hit Chicago, anyyyy day now.

ILLINOIS, Broods XIX and XIII

How does one state deserve so much luck in a single year? First, Illinois witnessed its second total solar eclipse in seven years. Now we’re double dipping on cicadas, with both Brood XIII and Brood XIX set to make their first joint appearance here in more than 200 years.

According to observers in southern Illinois, Brood XIX is here.

ALABAMA, Brood XIX

How’s it going in Alabama? Well here’s a report from a woman in northwest Alabama, posting to the Cicadas 2024 Facebook group: “At first I thought it was kinda cool that both the 13 and 17 yr cicadas were here [Editor’s note: not in Alabama]. But I am so over them!!!! There are so many and now they are starting to smell bad with how many there are.”

@imikemedia2 #cicada #cicadas #locust #cicadas2024 #alabama #cicadaseason #cicadatiktok ♬ original sound - imikemediatoo

ARKANSAS, Brood XIX

Thank you, Arkansas, for the best description of cicada song: “Sounds like mind control by the government.”

GEORGIA, Brood XIX

Excellent reminder to inspect any and all surfaces for cicadas.

WHAT'S THE BUZZ? Viewer Desiree Rumley says cicada season is in full swing in her Rising Fawn, Georgia yard!

Share your cicadas with us here: https://t.co/SOttwLOWj9 pic.twitter.com/cI5g813SrN
— WTVC NewsChannel 9 (@newschannelnine) May 6, 2024

The cicada pictures keep rolling in, and it looks like some of our Georgia communities may have the highest numbers on this emergence!! The trash can and car tire photos are blowing me away (and grossing me out a bit, haha).
Credits: Casey Elkins & Jerome Prince #cicadas pic.twitter.com/opEjkurdaZ
— Alison Pryor (@AlisonLocal3) May 3, 2024

MISSOURI, Brood XIX

Checking in on our frenemies to the south, there are some amazing images coming out of Missouri’s St. Francois County, which is roughly parallel to Carbondale.

SOUTH CAROLINA, Brood XIX

Mistakes were made. Namely in the form of 911 calls about a strange sound.

Entering the Twilight Zone.