The gray cicadas (Cicada orni) sing in perfectly synchronous choirs of tens, hundreds, or even thousands of males to call the females. When disturbed, they immediately stop singing and may fly away, spraying the intruder with a stream of urine. The poet Guillaume Apollinaire (1880-1918) already mentioned it in his calligram As well as the cicadas addressed to the people of Midi: You know how to drink and no longer know how to piss usefully like the cicadas.