{"id":5761,"date":"2015-10-25T12:51:31","date_gmt":"2015-10-25T19:51:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/?p=5761"},"modified":"2023-10-07T07:15:40","modified_gmt":"2023-10-07T14:15:40","slug":"catching-cicadas-in-north-carolina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/catching-cicadas-in-north-carolina\/","title":{"rendered":"Catching Cicadas in North Carolina"},"content":{"rendered":"

This past summer I had the opportunity to meet cicada expert Bill Reynolds<\/a><\/strong>. Bill manages the Arthropod Zoo at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences<\/a> in Raleigh, North Carolina. <\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Bill’s specialty is Neotibicen (formerly Tibicen) cicadas. Neotibicen are a genera of broad-headed, medium-sized, well-cammouflaged cicadas that belong to the tribe Cryptotympanini. <\/p>\n

I met Bill at the museum and allowed me to view his massive collection of Neotibicen — box after box of cicadas, all carefully pinned and labeled. See a small portion of Bill’s collection<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Megatibicen pronotalis:
\n\"Neotibicen<\/p>\n

Later we went for lunch, and listened for N. winnemanna hybrids<\/strong> in the neighborhood surrounding the museum. Close to the entrance of the museum, we heard a cicada that started with the call of the N. winnemanna and ended with the call of N. linnei — likely a hybrid. Around the museum neighborhood we heard other cicadas that sounded like<\/em> a N. winnemanna but not quite. Very interesting. <\/p>\n

Personally, my methods of catching cicadas are: 1) waiting until dark and grabbing them when they are still nymphs or eclosing, 2) grabbing them by hand on a tree or in flight, or 3) waiting for them to die, and collecting them from the ground. Bill introduced me to two new methods: 1) netting cicadas, and 2) finding cicadas under lights in parking lots. <\/p>\n

I own a net (purchased from BioQuip<\/a>) but I haven’t practiced using it. Bill Reynolds is a master of spotting and netting cicadas. He uses a net with 3 or 4 extension poles, which I belive gives him a 20′ reach. Bill is a cicada netting ninja<\/strong>. In a small, roadside patch of trees he caught three N. winnemanna in a matter of minutes.<\/p>\n

Here is a video of that grove of N. winnemanna patronized trees. (Listen, don’t watch. The video camera work is erratic and you won’t see any live cicadas):<\/p>\n