Latest Cicada News
Brood XIII 2007 Iowa Survey
I woke up early in the morning today because I needed to pack up my car. Everyone was still asleep. It took me a few hours to get everything packed up. I don't suspect I will be camping any more during this trip. I will probably stay in a hotel once I get to Iowa.
I said goodbye to everyone. John gave me some last minute instructions then I gassed up and hit the highway pretty early in the morning.
Arrival at Coralville Lake in Iowa
Well not really, I was actually a few miles south of Coralvi
Date Posted: 2007-06-10 Comments: (0) Category: Cicada Missions
Brood XIII 2007 June 9th
Well time is really getting on. I can't believe I have been away and out of work since May 30th studying Periodical Cicadas! If there was a way I could make money doing this, I'd surely give up the regular 9 - 5 job. I have learned so much and have met some really great people. The US Navy guys have been here for a little over a week and this apparently will be their last day. We continued on with the experiments however just to get the all-important data.
Huge and Loud Aggregation of M
Date Posted: 2007-06-09 Comments: (0) Category: Cicada Missions
Brood XIII 2007 - June 8th
Today started out very sunny but cool. I noticed that a lot of the M. cassini seemed to like to gather themselves low to the ground in order to get warm. Their black bodies absorb the heat from the sunlight so that they can warm up enough to start calling. You can see that this small group of M. cassini are pretty low to the ground because that is where the sun is in the morning.
The great folks at Jubilee College State park where we were camping have allowed UC Storrs to set up a series of sta
Date Posted: 2007-06-08 Comments: (0) Category: Cicada Missions
Brood XIII 2007 - June 7th
We met up with two researchers from the US Navy. They were given permission to set up their equipment in this rickety old barn with a dirt floor on a couple of work horses covered with plywood by the rangers at Jubilee College State Park. We were at the back of the park headquarters away from the general public. They had all kinds of measuring equipment which took them a very long time to set up.
Time to Get Some Volunteers (Specimens) for the Experiments.
While the researchers
Date Posted: 2007-06-07 Comments: (2) Category: Cicada Missions
Brood XIII 2007 - Mapping Continues
June 5, 2007 - More Distribution Mapping in the Springfield Area Today started out like yesterday with me trying to find a point where there were positive records and working from there. I spent the whole day alone and just driving around noting positive and negative data points. I didn't do much in the way of taking pictures and movies. I basically did a series of driving for 4 minutes, stopping, take a positive or negative data point and just moved on. I started in Athens, IL and ended up at
Date Posted: 2007-06-05 Comments: (0) Category: Cicada Missions
Brood XIII 2007 - June 4th, 2007
"Start with a Positive Record and End with a Positive Record." - That was John Cooley's credo. It is always important to start every distribution mapping project with an already known point that has a positive record of Magicicadas and just go from there. It is also as equally important to end with a positive record for the same reason. Then it is just a matter of surveying the areas in-between these two points.
Ordinarily, latitude and longitudinal readings should be taken with a GPS every 10t
Date Posted: 2007-06-04 Comments: (0) Category: Cicada Missions
Brood XIII Time to Say Goodbye
Well, today is the day that I need to leave Joe Green and Roy Troutman. I have a long drive ahead to hopefully hook up with John Cooley, David Marshall and Kathy Hill.
I was up early, which was kind of on the cool side. Joe met me outside in the parking lot of the hotel and we said our good byes. Joe was nice enough to loan me several books on Cicadas which to this day, I still haven't been able to send back to him. Hopefully, I will get them to him very soon. Its tough parting with such good i
Date Posted: 2007-06-03 Comments: (0) Category: Cicada Missions
Brood XIII 2007 - Tons of Fun!
Hi everyone, sorry I'm so late with the updates but there has been so much stuff going on that at the end of each day, I'm too tired to write anything. But I know that I am only making things worse for myself, because the longer I wait with the updates the more difficult it will be to get them done because I will fall farther and farther behind. Not to mention all the data and photos need to be arranged in such a way that makes sense for you. Suffice it to say, tons of interesting work is going
Date Posted: 2007-06-02 Comments: (0) Category: Cicada Missions
Brood XIII Found in Indiana!
Well, it took quite a while and I had to go a long way "off the beatin' path" as it were but I did manage to have some success in finding Brood XIII in Indiana.
I'm sorry but there are only 3 positive records, for some reason, time was of the essence so I really didn't note negative data points but I should have!! I stopped at a ton of places but neglected to record the negatives and I only got three positive sightings for Indiana.
I found a small park many miles outside Valparaiso,
Date Posted: 2007-06-01 Comments: (0) Category: Cicada Missions