Cicadas at Shelbyville / Storm at Latham

Despite visiting Ramsey Lake State Park and finding an abundance of cicadas, I wasn't satisfied with what I've seen already as there have been reports of locations where the ground is literally crawling. One such place I heard where this is occurring is the Lake Shelbyville area so on Friday I headed down to see. Sure enough, there was a massive abundance of cicadas and in spending nearly an entire day watching them, I came away with some interesting observations. The high frequency sound though seemingly constant is actually emitted in a pattern like a stadium crowd wave resonating through the forest canopy. At low points along the wave are entirely different sounds like a warbling trill. It is said that only males sing so I wonder if the sound emitted are females who are immediately followed by the chorus of males? In looking at an audio track you can easily see the waveform which I will demonstrate later. Since this day I have learned of other locations with even more cicadas but in the meantime enjoy some more shots of these curious insects.























Saturday evening provided an unexpected opportunity in the way of strong storms to drop into the region from the NW. For one long lived cell that fell into place at Latham IL, it was an easy intercept with the time of day being ideal for illuminating the clouds in a perfect light.











I have video from both of these events that I intend to post in coming days.