The summer of cicadas
By Rachel Fowler, Publisher/Editor-in-Chief | TLT Publisher's Pen September 2024
These interesting insects weren’t here long but made an impact.
This spring and summer were interesting here in the Midwest from mid-May to late June. I live in a Chicago suburb, and we had a big emergence of cicadas. I’m not a huge fan of bugs or insects, but after a while, I was getting used to having them around. The cicadas I experienced were big and loud to the point where it was difficult being outside for a long period of time, and my children would scream and run. I thought it would be interesting to do a little scientific research on these fascinating insects.
According to the National Museum of Natural History, “Periodical cicadas are insects that spend most of their lives underground as nymphs, feeding off the sap of tree roots. They emerge to transform into adults and mate. Some periodical cicadas emerge every 13 years and others emerge every 17 years. The males ‘sing’ by vibrating a membrane on the sides of their bodies.”
1
I read that temperature triggers when they come up from underground. This summer was rare because two broods (Brood XIII: the Northern Illinois Brood, which has a 17-year life cycle, and Brood XIX: the Great Southern Brood, which has a 13-year cycle) emerged at the same time, and I heard this has not happened since 1803. And this happened in my town!
The first sighting was in my driveway on May 15. Every day, I’d notice more and more crawling on our trees and spending time around the base of the trees. Then they started coming out of their shells, which left a bunch of empty shells all over the town. That’s when things started getting loud and didn’t stop until the end of June as the males were “singing.”
I was nervous around them at first, but I slowly realized they don’t do much. They were loud, of course, but they weren’t very fast and didn’t hurt anyone. They would fly around and land on my clothes, but I would quickly brush them off. I even held a few in my hand, which is something I wouldn’t normally do. My four-year-old daughter had a dance recital outside at a park on June 2, and the video I recorded has the loud screeching cicada noise in the background. Many young girls were screaming as they were flying around, but we made it through the recital. They lasted almost exactly six weeks and were gone by the end of June. Now that they are gone, it’s peaceful outside again.
It’s amazing that they spend 99% of their lives underground, come up for a few weeks, mate, lay eggs and die. Then the babies hatch out and go back underground to reappear in 13 or 17 years. I read that they spend their time underground feeding on plant roots—that’s a long time underground!
What did I learn this summer? Cicadas are loud, interesting insects, and I’d be happy if we didn’t have two broods at the same time again. But they aren’t so scary—they have a unique life!
REFERENCE
1.
https://naturalhistory.si.edu/education/teaching-resources/life-science/periodical-cicadas
You can reach TLT publisher/editor-in-chief Rachel Fowler at rfowler@stle.org.