You're so welcome, and you are wise to ask if your young plantings need protection from the Brood X cicadas that will be appearing soon throughout our area.

Adult cicadas (which are completely harmless to humans, of course) do not feed, according to the US Dept of Agriculture; however, the adult females make slit-like holes near the ends of smaller twigs and branches of trees and shrubs in which to lay their eggs. Larger, healthier trees and shrubs will recover from this egg laying process with no lasting impact. However young or newly planted trees are at risk of long-term damage or death. If many female cicadas lay their eggs in the branches of trees and shrubs, it may cause tips of branches to wilt and die. You can protect smaller trees and shrubs by wrapping the tree with mesh. Openings in the netting should be less than 1 cm or about ⅜ inch in width. This will exclude cicadas and keep them away from branches.

So to answer your question specifically, netting with this hole sizing would probably be better than mosquito netting because it would still allow smaller sized insects to access and pollinate any blooms that might be occurring on your plants. You might want to check your plants for active nests before netting them (so as not to trap any birds inside), and remember to remove the netting when the egg laying is finished (approximately 8 weeks after the cicadas' first appearance).

Here are three links if you'd like to learn more about cicadas, and about this very special Brood X that we will be witnessing soon.

https://extension.umd.edu/hgic/topics/cicadas

https://extension.umd.edu/ipm/brood-x-periodical-cicadas

https://cicadacrewumd.weebly.com/

~ Karin