Tagged: Insects

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RENEE MONTAGNE, HOST:

Good morning. I'm Renee Montagne. Minnesota's Mall of America is home to some 500 stores, a theme park and now some 72,000 ladybugs. Third graders released them inside the shopping center this week. Ladybugs protect the mall's 30,000 plants by eating aphids. Some mall-goers worried the bugs might descend on the food court, but a spokesman says the mall has released the ladybugs for years, and there's been no ladybug takeover yet. It's MORNING EDITION. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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DAVID GREENE, HOST:

And our last word in business today is: The Cicada Index.

Every 17 years, these nasty, loud, little insects known as Brood 2 cicadas emerge in staggering numbers - as many as on billion per square mile from the Carolinas to Connecticut.

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

They have a grinding song. They have an endless appetite for vegetation, and most people along the East Coast dread their arrival. But savvy investors know better.

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JACKI LYDEN, HOST:

It's WEEKENDS on ALL THINGS CONSIDERED from NPR News. I'm Jacki Lyden. Spring is here. And just as temperatures begin to creep up, so do the bugs - all matter of creepy crawlies. Among the noisiest and, for my money, most repulsive...

(SOUNDBITE OF CICADAS)

LYDEN: ...cicadas.

MICHAEL RAUPP: My name is Michael J. Raupp. I'm professor of entomology and the bug guy here at the University of Maryland, College Park.