North Aurora woman eagerly waited 17 years to be part of cicada buzz

Seventeen years ago, North Aurora resident Bettina Sailer felt cheated when her yard did not buzz with the sound of 17-year cicadas.

She went to other areas of the state where cicadas were plentiful and brought them back to her yard. With her yard facing a similar lack of cicadas this year, she has been doing the same thing and now has more than 6,000 cicadas in her yard.

Sailer created new homes for the cicadas underneath insect netting that she has placed over trees in her front yard. A sign she has placed in front of her trees fittingly says Come Back Tour 2024.

According to experts, cicadas need to feed on trees almost constantly for most of their lives, so they typically are only found in areas that had trees 17 years ago and have continued to have trees since then.

That’s why you likely will not see cicadas in highly developed areas.

Sailer’s fascination with cicadas started years ago, when she was 24. She now is 58.

“A friend had asked me if I wanted to see these bright red-eyed bugs,” Sailer said. “We all jumped in my car with a box. I was freaked out by it at first, the buzzing sound and everything. But then I got used to it and I started picking them up and putting them in a box.”

That led to her being interested in them even though she doesn’t like most bugs.

“They didn’t sting and they didn’t bite and red is my favorite color, followed by orange,” she said. “So I’m like, ‘These bugs are really kind of cool.’ ‘’

She displays her love for cicadas through her tattoos, her cicada necklace and earrings and her shirt that proudly asks, “Got Cicadas?”

At least one cicada has resurfaced after being underground in her yard for the past 17 years.

“One came out of the ground in my yard,” Sailer said. “I was so excited.”

Despite the netting, sparrows still are trying to get at the cicadas.

“What the sparrows are doing is that they are landing on the netting and they’re pecking at them to eat them,” Sailer said. “And sometimes they rip the netting and get in.”

Sailer hopes that 17 years from now more cicadas will emerge from her yard. She said a few of the cicadas she brought to her yard have been laying eggs.

Helping her put up the netting was Batavia resident Sylvia Keppel. Sailer and Keppel are members of the Batavia Community Band.

They haven’t determined if they can play louder than the buzzing cicadas.

Keppel also is a fan of cicadas.

“I really like that they have such an odd life cycle, that they go 17 years before emerging,” she said. “It’s very unusual. God makes really strange animals sometimes.”