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US braces for cicadas by the trillion as two broods of periodic insects coincide
- leipert 3y agoSo time to invest in Sesame futures?
- fnordian_slip 3y agoIn case anyone needs the reference: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUxMY77i0q4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUxMY77i0q4 On-topic: I don't know why, but the videos of masses of cicadas always seemed so overwhelming to me, I mean I just cannot imagine walking through an effected area. Nature can truly produce incredible phenomena.
- piva00 3y agoI'd include locusts as well, I cannot fathom the experience of being in the path of a insects swarm extending for hundreds to thousands of kilometres.
- onewheeltom 3y agoBut then the locusts would be eating anything green in their path as they were swarming. Cicadas are a walk in the park, comparatively.
- bdjsiqoocwk 3y agoIn the real world, by the time this reaches the news it's already priced in.
- chrisgd 3y agoI upvoted you, but would say - Only if you assume markets are perfectly efficient. It seems there is often some money to be made.
- mensetmanusman 3y agoTimes nicely with the Armageddon of 2024.
- jjtheblunt 3y agoFun math in action here: these two broods emerge every 13 and 17 years, respectively. Those two numbers are coprime, so their least common multiple, the next time a multiple of one will coincide with a multiple of the other, is 13 * 17 = 221, which subtracted from 2024 is 1803, when Thomas Jefferson was president and the previous time the broods emerged in the same year.
- soared 3y agoThats from the article The simultaneous appearance of the two cicada broods – known as Brood XIX and Brood XII – is a rare event, not having occurred since 1803, a year when Thomas Jefferson was US president
- jjtheblunt 3y agoRight but the article didn’t explain the calculation
- lisper 3y agoAlso to the point: the reason that the breeding cycles of these species are prime numbers of years is that it makes it less likely for a successful predator to evolve. To be a successful specialized predator of these species, your feeding cycle has to be a multiple of their breeding cycle which in practical terms means, since the cycles are so long, it has to be a exact match.
- jjtheblunt 3y agoThe 13s also get 17-1 breeding iterations without shared food competition from the 17s, etc, during the breeding days. The coprime periods effect strong attraction to the involved prime periods.
- lisper 3y agoTrue but that’s less of a factor because the two species don’t have a lot of geographic overlap.
- seydor 3y agoPeter Gregory is pleased
- esafak 3y agoTime to load up on sesame seed futures.
- gosub100 3y agoTake notice if you're a motorcycle rider. If you see a swarm, pull over and drive at minimum speed because crushed bugs en masse can absolutely de-bike you.
- autoexec 3y ago> The two broods may only overlap slightly in a small area of central Illinois, meaning there mostly won’t be a larger-than-normal boom in numbers in any one place It's too bad that for all the headlines making this sound like a biblical plague the reality will be that this summer won't be much different from normal unless you actually care to get to so up close and personal with these bugs that you'll notice differences in species. I'm hoping that they'll at least sound different enough that I can appreciate the variety since I almost never see them crawling or flying.
- robotnikman 3y agoI remember last time the 17 year brood emerged I was living in Illinois. I remember riding my bike to school and it was impossible to not run over a bunch of cicadas. Also a nearby zoo was paying people to bring in buckets of them which they would use to feed animals there.
- nharada 3y agoYeah I remember this, it was pretty gross in a fascinating way. You'd walk outside and every step was crunchy.
- fbdab103 3y agoWhat is the going rate for a bucket of cicadas? The logistics of transportation sound tricky. Am I scooping up dead cicadas? If live, transporting the bulk intact is going to be fun. I am imagining broke teenagers balancing squirming buckets on a bike handlebars.
- robotnikman 3y agoYep, it was basically something for us kids and teens to do to make some cash, and iirc there were a decent amount of people who did it that lived nearby the zoo
- cheese_van 3y agoIs the US really "bracing" for this event? Girding their loins to brace in anticipation of this event? Bracing their bodies or their minds? Will the Walmart people make runs on toilet paper? If I want to properly brace, what do the experts say? Brace, brace, brace. Brace for bugs.
- HankB99 3y agoI'm in Illinois not far from where the broods overlap. I'm looking forward to it. The last big brood was a bust where I live (About 30 miles west of Chicago downtown.)
- roshin 3y agoIf the person in charge doesn't properly "brace" then the opposing party will "slam" them
- cko 3y agoOr "rip" or "sound off" on them even. After all, they've been issued a FINAL WARNING.
- tiptup300 3y agoEarplugs at least. Man, walking outside to a concert volume roar was nuts. And then them flying around and pelting you. Then opening your car door quick and shutting it because they like to fly at you right as you get in in. Was driving and noticed one walking on my neck. I certainly was braced in that moment.
- hollywood_court 3y agoMy family and I just arrived in Dallas to see the eclipse since it’s on the same day as my son’s 5th birthday. Where should we travel to see the cicadas?
- schoen 3y agoYou have a chance to see them in northwestern Lousiana or western Arkansas: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periodical_cicadas#Map_of_brood_locations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Periodical_cicadas#Map_of_broo... You might want to double-check with a local. The ones closest to you in Dallas would be Brood XIX, the light blue ones on the map.
- tedunangst 3y agoCicada broods only come out infrequently, but people freaking out about cicadas is closer to an annual tradition. https://www.washingtonpost.com/food/2021/05/11/cicadas-restaurant-patios/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/food/2021/05/11/cicadas-resta...
- geetee 3y agoIsn't it Brood XIII, not XII?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- marifjeren 3y agoYes. (source: > In 2024, 13-year Brood XIX, which is the largest of all periodical cicada broods, will co-emerge with 17-year Brood XIII; these two broods are adjacent (but not significantly overlapping) in north-central Illinois. - https://cicadas.uconn.edu/ https://cicadas.uconn.edu/)
- cosmin800 3y agoAre they edible? We should eat them, protein powder.
- fearmerchant 3y agoI see no signs of being braced.