Officials from a national park in northern Maryland are cautioning residents who were eager to see the disappearance of pesky Brood X cicadas that there are new cicadas on the way.
In a Facebook post on Wednesday, Catoctin Mountain Park said that while Brood X, which the National Park Service says is the largest of the 17-year-cycle broods, may be gone, annual cicadas are about to emerge.
The dog-day cicada, or Neotibicen canicularis, got its name because it emerges during July and August, the hottest months of summer, according to the Arthropod Museum.
“Although they are labeled as annual, they take 2-3 years to develop and emerge. Unlike periodical cicadas, the population is not synced up allowing an emergence to happen every year giving the appearance of being annual,” Catoctin Mountain Park said in its post.
The winged creatures have black eyes and are larger than periodical cicadas, the national park noted.
“Like all cicadas, they are harmless and like to scream,” officials noted.
The cicada killer wasp feeds on dog-day cicadas, according to Ohio State University, which notes that killer wasps do not prey on any periodical cicadas. Only the female killer wasps have stingers, and they rarely sting humans.
The university also noted that male dog-day cicadas attract female cicadas by ‘“singing,” though not in massive choruses like periodical ones.