Cicada Madness

Cicadas are large, loud insects that spend their nymphal stages underground until they crawl out, climb a tree trunk, and emerge as winged insects. They have 1-year (annual) and 13- or 17-year (periodical) life cycles. Yearly emergences are consistent and plentiful in certain places to become a dependable “hatch”—fish key in on them when they fall into the water and become easy meals. Everything from carp and smallmouth on Eastern rivers to trout on fabled waters such as Utah’s Green River or Wyoming’s Wind River grow fat on this annual feast.

But the feeding frenzy kicks into high gear every three or four years when periodical cicadas emerge. These insects have been underground for 13 or 17 years (identified by different brood names) and emerge en masse in mind boggling numbers. Many of them take to trees along highways or deep in the woods where their call is deafening, and everything from birds to snakes to turkeys feed voraciously on them. Many of them also emerge at the bases of trees and bushes that line streams and lakes, and fall into the water so regularly that fish become keyed into them. Even fish that are not designed to feed on the surface, such as carp and freshwater drum, contort their bodies to be able to take part in this daily buffet that last for about a month. Anglers can follow this hatch and fish cicadas for two or three months, and if they understand what broods are hatching where, can fish cicadas almost every year if so inclined.

This is the first book dedicated to the patterns, techniques, and more importantly, the science of locating the best hatches of these insects.

Dave Zielinski has fished periodical and annual cicada emergences for decades on waterways in Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio, Michigan, West Virginia, Virginia, and Maryland. He has been featured in a film and several podcasts on fly fishing for cicadas, including Remote. No Pressure. Fly fishing Podcast, July 21, 2019, which can be found here: https://www.remotenopressure.com/blogs/news/boating-for-cicadas-dave-zielinski

He owns Down Home Boat Works (www.downhomeboatworks.com), an online business for wooden boat designs, plans, and finished boats specifically for fly fishing. He contributed to Drift Boats & River Dories: Their History, Design, Construction and Use by Roger L. Fletcher (see chapter 15, “The Trapper”). He attends fly fishing shows in the East promoting his boats. He lives in Saltsburg, PA.