By the Light of a Honeymoon

(Page 3 of 3)

June/July 1995
By Fred Schaaf  
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Unlike locusts, cicadas are generally quite harmless, sucking sap which trees can afford rather than chewing up leaves and everything else of vegetable nature. In different parts of the U.S. there are different broods of the 17-year cicada, but the most famous, "Brood I," appears and sounds off this summer in the Middle Atlantic states. All members of this genus of cicada—unique to the U.S.—share in common that they endure the 17-year hibernation in the ground before digging up to break free into the air with their redorange wing edgings and buzz-saw-loud but very haunting song.

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In the last issue I mentioned that on May 22 the planet Saturn's rings would be displayed sideways to Earth for the first time in 15 years. I noted that the rings are so thin when viewed from this "edgewise" presentation that they would seem to vanish from sight even in the world's biggest telescopes. But I promised that after this edgewise presentation there would be more strange appearances of Saturn in the months ahead. And indeed that is so: During June and July a good amateur telescope will show you Saturn with no trace of rings—except on very steady nights a thin black line or two (the darkened rings and their shadow).

Saturn rises around the middle of the night, at which time the naked eye sees it as the brightest point of light low in the east. But unless you're already an experienced amateur astronomer you should probably wait until later in the summer to look for it. As you'll learn in my next column, the rings in August will burst back into sunlight and offer sights more glorious than any yet.

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