Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, August 1, 1993                   TAG: 9307300054
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV-2   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: STEVE KARK
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

HUM IN THE TREES IS A CICADA SYMPHONY

If you live near trees, you should be able to hear a high-pitched whine coming from the tallest branches. There is an intensity to the sound. On really hot days it seems to grow, rising and falling in relentless pulsations.

It sounds more like a high-voltage electrical hum than something natural; it seems out of place in our peaceful woods.

But the source of this peculiar sound is a bug little more than an inch long, not counting its wings.

People erroneously call this little noisemaker a locust, a type of grasshopper, which it isn't. No, what you hear is a cicada, an insect that has developed one of nature's unusual survival techniques.

According to Michael Kosztarab, an entomologist at Virginia Tech, what you're hearing in the trees probably is the dog-day cicada, frequently heard each year about this time.

Incidentally, they are called "dog-day" cicadas because they typically are heard during the dog days of summer, a period - as I'm sure you're well aware - running from about mid-July to early September.

What is curious about this bug is that it spends most of its life underground, unseen and unheard, dining on rootsap. We're aware of its presence only during the short span of time it emerges, mates and dies.

The noise it makes is, at least in part, the mating call of the male. This call is also used to mark territory and to signal the approach of danger - a hungry bluejay, for instance.

The dog-day cicada generally spends about three years in the dark. Another type of cicada, the periodical cicada, spends 14 to 17 years in the lightless world, only to emerge for a few brief weeks of sunshine at the end of its life.

Why?

Well, experts like Kosztarab have determined that it is precisely the length of time the bug spends below ground that ensures its survival. Emerging only periodically in large numbers means that all will not be eaten by predators.

Thus, in the few weeks it spends above the ground, the cicada has a better chance of attracting a mate and reproducing.

There is, however, another predator, against which these patterns of emergence offer little defense: in many parts of the world - especially in the tropics, where cicadas are most abundant - people find them useful as a source of protein.

Kosztarab says cicadas actually are quite tasty when correctly prepared. If you find them just after they've molted, he says, cicadas may be sauteed in butter, similar to the way you might cook a soft-shell crab.

If not, they can be prepared like shrimp. Remove head, wings and legs, he advises, dip them in batter and deepfry them.

As an appetizer, he recommends a few grasshoppers.

Bon Appetit!

Steve Kark is an instructor at Virginia Tech and a correspondent for the Roanoke Times & World-News. He writes from his home in scenic Rye Hollow, in a remote part of Giles County south of Pearisburg.