For me, these insects embody the sound of summer. Their long wheezy, buzzy call from somewhere in the treetops sounds like a lazy, hot summer day. This one, when I found him, was still attached to his pupal case, having just emerged from it, one leg still stuck. He finally shrugged it free and then sat and waited for his wings to harden so that he could fly, a process that takes quite some time. Prior to emerging, this one would, like all other so-called 'annual' cicadas, have spent several years underground in the pupal stage feeding on the roots of plants. Despite this, they do little damage to plants or anything else. They do provide food for birds. And in some parts of the world, they have long been eaten by humans. Cicadas belong to the Hemiptera, the bugs. They are not, as often thought, related to grasshoppers or crickets.