The "Background Music At The Cicada Festival" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Checking the website: The Original Mt. Gretna "Cicada Festival Concerts" to see if the concert series, scheduled for August 3-11, may have been canceled due to COVID-19.    We have been going to their concerts for close to ten years which are held at the open-air, outdoor Gretna Theatre at the Mt. Gretna Playhouse.  

The advertisement for the Cicada Festival at Mt. Gretna

The site is set in the woods at Mt. Gretna, Pennsyl- vania and the open-air theatre is the perfect location to listen to good old Rock & Roll.  But, if the concert is still scheduled to go on...it may be a bit more noisy than in the past, since this is the year that the cicadas are due to emerge for their once-in-17 year mating season.  As many as 1.5 million cicadas could emerge per acre and they will add some noisy background music for the bands performing this year.  Not necessarily a disruptive noice, but a distinct chirping!  Carol and I have never been to a concert when the cicadas have been active, but I was hoping to have a chance to see what type of background they would add to the bands.  A Virginia Tech professor said that, "Hopefully, any annoyance at the disturbance is tempered by just how infrequent...and amazing...the event is."  There are two types of of cicadas, periodical and annual, with the periodical cicadas emerging every 13 to 17 years, depending upon the species.  

The Periodical Cicada

Brood IX, as this group is dubbed, last emerged in 2003.  Parts of the region that's expected to see this brood also saw some of brood II, which crawled out from the ground back in 2013 across parts of Eastern U.S.  But brood IX won't likely affect as many states.  Why does the periodical cicada appear only every 13-17 years?  It is reported that it may be to avoid predators who treat the cicada as an easy meal.  They may be trying to avoid matching cycles and appear without notice to their predators.  The insects spend the majority of their lives underground, in an immature "nymph" state with soil temperatures and year synchronizing their transition to a mature cicada, ready to emerge, breed and lay eggs.  Climate change is what can change their emerging between 13 to 17 years.  

Another view of the cicada

Once they have emerged and bred, they die within a few weeks.  It is during those few weeks that they add the background rhythm to the songs circulating in our head.  At times it can be overwhelming and annoying.  Just how do they appear all of a sudden?  They break through like the undead emerging from their graves.   They travel in huge packs in the same direction through the woods, scurrying up trees, covering all their branches.  At this point they break through their exoskeletons, at first sickly white and soft before they take on their red-eyed, coal-black adult form and then fly off by the billions.  They're big and noisy...perfect for a rock & roll band.  The periodical cicadas' life span is among the longest of any insect, spending years and years underground eating tree roots, before breaking through the ground and seeing the light of day for just a few short days.  

Breaking through the exoskeleton

There are 15 regions in the United States where the cicadas' will emerge.  They have already started to call out to females in Virginia, West Virginia and North Carolina.  As far as the area where I live, since the weather has been rather cool this spring, they may not appear until mid-summer.  Might they appear just in time for the concert?  If you happen to see them, do not fret.  They are not poisonous and don't bite or sting.  And, once the eggs hatch, the nymphs fall to the ground where they will nestle into the earth for the next 17 years.  What a life!  So enjoy them if you happen to see or hear them, for it will be another 13-17 years before they will return once again to add harmony to the many other noises you may hear in the woods...or on the stage at the Cicada Festival.  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy. 

PS - A few days ago my check that I sent for payment of four tickets to the concert was returned to me.  It wasn't due to the cicadas, but Covid-19.  The close quarters in the outdoor auditorium could spread the virus among the over 50 crowd and create a real problem.  Perhaps by next summer the virus will have been conquered and I will once again be able to hear some of my favorite music at the festival.