The first day of cicada chasing exceeded expectations and we hoped for similar results on the second. However the weather began to change overnight with downpours possible during daylight hours. Local meteorologists predicted a line of thunderstorms rolling through the Midwest, approaching from the west. It would hit Peoria, Illinois mid-morning and St. Louis, Missouri around lunchtime so we needed to leave Peoria as soon as possible.
In fact we could already see clouds building as the sun rose. There was no time to waste and we hit the road. Unfortunately we couldn’t stop for additional cicada sightings anywhere along the route as we crossed the invisible border between the two Broods. Rain splattered the windshield outside of Springfield, Illinois but we kept moving and drove away from the storm.
Missouri Botanical Garden
Into the Garden
The Cicada Safari app noted recent sightings at the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis (map). Naturally these were all members of the Great Southern Brood of 13-year cicadas because we were now firmly within that territory.
I’ve been to St. Louis before but I’ve never been to the botanical garden. This was a new experience for me and I have to say I was greatly impressed. It’s totally worth a visit even without the cicadas. In fact, I will keep this on the list for my next trip to St. Louis because I want to savor it without wandering haphazardly looking for bugs.
It’s quite spectacular. Wikipedia says it’s the second largest in North America behind only New York, with 6.6 million specimens on 79 acres. And I can vouch for it based on what I could see. I did my best to appreciate the wonderful gardens and meticulous landscaping as we followed the deafening drone of cicadas drawing us to one particular corner.
A Special Encounter
We could hear them but we couldn’t see them yet. Then we spotted a large group of birds, primarily grackles, swooping down and dive-bombing a grove of trees deep within the garden. Looking closer, we could see the silhouette of cicada blobs flying amongst the treetops. Every time one moved a grackle would try to pick it off. Little pieces of shredded cicada wings and legs and body parts littered the walking path. So it was a prime spot for viewing cicadas being decimated by predators but not so much for getting close to them.
However, that’s part of the fascinating cicada lifecycle too. They overwhelm their foes in such great abundance that it allows a tiny handful to survive long enough to reproduce. The grackles and other predators simply can’t eat them all. And we did find a couple of survivors hidden within the leaves. They were the 13-year dwarf species (Magicicada tredecassini). We saw a lot of those the previous day but even so we still enjoyed the spectacle of this frenzied survival strategy as it unfolded in real life.
The Reckoning
The sky kept an angry gray hue as we explored the garden and droplets began to pitter-pattered around us, cutting the hunt short. The initial storm gave us a glancing blow — missing by maybe a mile — but another line approached. We understood we didn’t have much time left. So we’d reached the end of the chase even if we had other places on our list (like the St. Louis Zoo). Fortunately our first day was so wildly successful that we didn’t even feel disappointed.
The cicada chase concluded. Or so we thought.
City Museum
Even so, we still had plenty of day ahead of us and we didn’t want to waste it. A friend suggested the City Museum closer to downtown (map). I can’t even begin to describe the place but the museum says it’s “weirdly wonderful” and that sounds about right.
It’s not a museum; well, parts of it sort-of are but then it throws in interconnected tunnels, confusing mazes, multi-story slides, psychedelic lighting, and oddities galore. So there might be an exhibit on architectural elements salvaged from late 19th Century buildings, and then a disco complete with a dance floor and DJ. The whole point was to get lost and discover strange new things.
There was an entomology room in the City Museum. Wait, what? Yes, an entire room of bugs on display along with an accompanying staff entomologist. Honestly I couldn’t tell if he was on display as part of the exhibit or not (“see an actual bug scientist at work!“), because the place was just that weird. No other room came with its own scientific expert.
He was pinning bugs and attaching labels at a little table in the corner. But more importantly he had a clear plastic box of live cicadas he’d collected that day. They were all the 13-year dwarfs we’d seen so frequently during our safari although that was hardly the point. No, we simply couldn’t escape cicadas even when we tried! So we spent some time geeking out on cicadas and swapping stories, and got a little mini-tour of some of the more exotic bugs in the collection. I guess this opened-up a whole new career path for my recently graduated kid.
Bonus!
Afternoon waned and it was time to head to our hotel in the western suburbs, closer to the airport. We had to catch an early morning flight back home and the location seemed pretty convenient. We took Interstate 64 and then I-270, the loop road around the western side of St. Louis, heading towards the town of Maryland Heights (map). Right around the confluence of those two highways we began to hear it: the unmistakable sound of cicadas. On a busy highway with the windows rolled up and a ton of road noise on every side of us, the cicadas were even louder.
Suddenly they were everywhere, flying in all directions. They ricocheting off the highway, splatted on windshields, smacked into road signs. None of it mattered to them. They had no concept of highways or moving vehicles so they flew slow and dumb, compelled by their instincts. The swarm persisted all the way to the hotel and we got unexpected opportunity to observe them close-up (once again the 13-year dwarfs). I stood in the parking lot as they literally bounced off my chest.
This was the largest concentration of cicadas we’d seen on the entire trip. Ironically the two times we saw the most cicadas were instances when we weren’t even looking for them at all (the other time was at the covered bridge on Day 1).
Celebratory Dinner
We selected Six Mile Bridge Beer in Maryland Heights, Missouri to celebrate the final end of the cicada chase. It was less than a mile from our hotel so it seemed like a good choice. The cicada swarm extended out there too.
Wrap-up
We were pleased with the results. During the two days we observed species belonging to both the Great Southern Brood (XIX) and the Northern Illinois Brood (XIII). Those included 3 of the 7 known species, and 3 of the 4 common species.
Also I picked up four new counties in central Illinois for my County Counting collection: Logan; Macoupin; Montgomery; and Sangamon. Then I converted St. Louis County, Missouri and Peoria County, Illinois to new overnight counties. Not bad considering it wasn’t even the purpose of the trip.
Leave a Reply