CHARLOTTE, N.C. — It was the great emergence that everyone was anticipating earlier this spring.

Cicadas that had been hibernating underground for the last 17 years were expected to come out in droves and create a whole lot of noise. But, North Carolina missed out.

While most swat and squash bugs out of annoyance, insects and spiders are Dawn Flynn’s best friend.

“My expertise is in a group of insects called treehoppers, that are in the same group of insects as aphids,” Flynn explained.

As the Curator of Entomology at Gastonia’s Schiele Museum of Natural History and Planetarium, she is an expert in identifying 70,000 kinds of creepy crawlers from the south-central Piedmont of the Carolinas.

“I am one of 14 world authorities on the identification of treehoppers,” Flynn said.

Scientists from around the world seek out Flynn’s expertise on anything from giant wasps called "cicada killers" to beautiful butterflies she cataloged. Recently, the taxonomy guru has been bugging in excitement about the harmless, yet horror film looking bugs known as cicadas.

“Brood 10, which are on a 17-year cycle, began emerging from the ground and started marching up trees across the southeast United States. When we hear them singing, they’re the boys singing for the girls,” she explained.

Many in North Carolina likely cringed at the thought: swarms of black, beadie-eyed insects squawking and squalling from the trees before their carcasses rained down on freaked-out people below.

“They’re much more individuals further north like in Pennsylvania, Washington D.C., and Virginia,” Flynn said in explaining why the Tarheel state was spared. However, Flynn said we will soon get our fair share.

“XIX, Brood 19, is going to come out in 2024 and that brood is a 13-year brood, 13-year cicada and it will come into North Carolina,” she explained. “In fact, Brood 19 is called the 'Great Southern Brood', so there is a lot of them.”

While the sight of them may freak us out, their existence is actually rather simple.

“They only live long enough to mate and both of them die,” Flynn said.

The published and passionate promoter of pests said the cicada is more than just a nasty nuisance.

“All kinds of animals feed on them as well. Ground animals feed on them, so they provide a lot of food for nature,” she said.

There have been a lot of questions about dogs and cats sniffing out dead cicadas and whether it’s safe for them to eat them. Cicadas are not poisonous and they can be a tasty snack, but if a dog eats too many of them, it can give them an upset stomach and even induce vomiting.