Copperhead and Cicada

A story in the Springfield News Leader reported on the mid-summer cicada season where they provide a buffet for copperheads.  John Miller of MDC had always referred to them as "copperhead M&Ms" and here is photographic proof.

Charlton McDaniel had been floating on the Mulberry River in Arkansas where he saw several cicada's that were starting to emerge from their pupae.  They emerge from their winter quarters in the ground this time of year.  They typically climb up on to a tree trunk where they begin their struggle to leave the pupae and dry out before find mates.



At this stage they are helpless, their wings not expanded, their bodies not yet hardened.  And the copperheads know this.  McDaniel's fantastic photographs at Tulsaworld.com document what happened next.

It was nearly the same date seven years ago that our friend Sheila called to report an invasion of copperheads in her front yard.  We described her encounter at length in a blog listed below.*  While patrolling her front yard the next evening she found several looking at her from eye level.  They had wiggled straight up on tree trunks to where their treats were hanging on.  And where there is one cicada, there are frequently several, even enough to stage a copperhead banquet.  A similar event occurred at Pine Ridge Church and its "Copperhead Capitol" designation described here.  This is not a unique story.

"Reports of mid-summer clusters or irruptions of copperheads are not just from Bull Creek.  A mid-summer 2005 gathering of 100 copperheads under a cedar tree in Marion County, Arkansas was investigated by an Arkansas State University zoologist with no apparent cause found.   Recent accounts tell of gatherings occurring in Southwest Missouri and Texas.  In summer of 2011 a man in Georgia reported 30 copperheads in his yard."

Don't worry about going for an evening walk....but you might want to take a flashlight.  If you see a copperhead, leave it alone unless it is a direct threat to your friends and family.  Remember, it is part of nature and this is its Halloween search for candy.  Then it has to return to its usual diet of mostly mice.

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* The story behind the copperhead clusters is all told in this blog.