Summer song now includes cicada chorus

By My Courier-Tribune

The sounds of summer are a little different than what is heard during the spring months. Though there are still bird songs here and there, some of the most distinguishable sounds are those of grasshoppers, katydids and cicadas.

Cicadas, though small in stature, are mighty in sound, according to the state Department of Conservation. Using a piece of their exoskeleton called the tymbal that they click together and their hollow abdomens, cicadas can make and amplify sounds.

Depending on the time of day, and the call itself, people can identify the cicada. Missouri is currently full of annual cicadas singing. There is the ““pzee-ape, pzee-ape” of Robinson cicadas in the afternoon and the “dirrrrrr, dirrrrrr” sounds coming from dusk cicadas in the evenings.

There are two categories naturalists like to put cicadas in: annual and periodical. The bigger cicadas emerge from the ground, after spending time feeding on plant roots every year.

“However, the phenomenon of the smaller, periodical cicadas is truly spectacular. Every 13 to 17 years, broods emerge in large numbers from the ground along the trees in search of a mate,” reads a release from the Missouri Department of Conservation.

The chorus of male cicadas can reach up to decibels of 120, the loudest of all insect produced sounds. It is equivalent to a jackhammer or chainsaw.