This is a wild headline from NPR: "A fungus is turning cicadas into horny zombies — but don’t panic."
"[The fungus] Massospora cicadina has been observed in cicadas in more than half a dozen states — both those belonging to Brood XIII, which emerges every 17 years and is concentrated in Illinois, and of Brood XIX, a 13-year group that is distributed across much of the southeast."
@Wen@quixoticgeek another horrorstory on #insects
Usually this means the story teller wants attention for his story, not that #insects are harm full. They are just nature
Seems likely they are more "flighty" in the spring and early summer when the flowers are a bit sparser. But if you're patient you'll eventually come across one feeding calmly.
(06/03/24)
The male has golden hair and a yellow face, the female has a black face and a whiter coat.
They both have a very long tongue, a black and white striped abdomen, and a noisy buzz. Seen together feeding on a vitex tree - and occasionally getting into an argument - at @cowboycatranch
Cicadas are back, but climate change is messing with their body clocks.
CBS News reports: "Cicada watchers used to be able to predict their emergence as easily as astronomers could predict the recent solar eclipse. But that has become more challenging as the cicadas' patterns are changing as warm spring days happen more often."
NEWS: Lars Chittka, Ph.D., professor of sensory and behavioural ecology at Queen Mary University of London, has been selected to deliver the Founders' Memorial Award Lecture at Entomology 2024. Chittka will recount the pioneering accomplishments of Charles Henry Turner, Ph.D. (1867-1923), a Black entomologist whose discoveries on insect sensory systems, learning, personality, and intelligence were a century ahead of their time. #EntSoc24#entomology#insects MORE: https://entsoc.org/news/press-releases/lars-chittka-2024-founders-memorial-lecture
There are so many pretty flies I had never seen before. Today I came across a red bodied one that was too fidgety to photograph well but was unlike the one with a red stripe I found on the glass last week. And a golden sheen one with a metallic blue bottom that appears to have white frets on the side #biodiversity#inthegarden#insects#latespring