First of all it took me a few years to figure out that what I, a Mid-Atlantic native, knew as โcicadasโ were not what everyone else knew as cicadas. What most places on Earth know as โcicadasโ look like this:
whereas what I know as cicadas are these:
This is Magicicada septendecim, the 17-year periodical cicada. Many places have summer cicadas in moderation every year, but here on the North American Eastern Seaboard we save them all up for one MONSTER horde that only appears every 17 years. There are multiple broods of cicadas, so really a handful hatch every year, but the big one is BROOD X. Technically that means โBrood 10โณ because cicada broods are labeled with Roman numerals, but BROOD X sounds much cooler and also evokes the right amount of batshit weirdness that occurs, because what occurs is the largest insect emergence in the world. Donโt take my word for it, take David Attenboroughโs:
When May comes in a cicada year, the cicadas. Are. EVERYWHERE. I mean every. where. Literal billions - possibly a trillion - of these big ole bugs dig their way up through every inch of soil on the East Coast, climb up the nearest object, then split their shells and spread new-grown wings to the first sun theyโve seen in almost two decades.
And then they probably get eaten. 17-year cicadas use a survival strategy called โpredator satiationโ which literally means โthey canโt eat us all.โ Cicadas are a) huge b) dumb and c) defenseless, so to a predator they might as well be flying Snickers bars. But there are so many goddamn cicadasย that no reasonable number of predators can eat them all. We think thatโs why they converge on prime-number lifecycles - there are also 13-year periodical cicadas - because that way predators canโt line up shorter periodical lifecycles to take advantage of the cicada boom.
So how are people not losing their shit when billions of bugs invade? Well, some do. But to make up for their frightening numbers, cicadas are so non-threatening they might as well have been designed by Disney. Plump, clumsy, and googly-eyed, these idiots donโt bite, donโt sting, canโt poison you, and donโt eat your plants. They donโt even fight each other - males join up rather than compete. Cicadas lack the survival instinct god gave a literal gnat and wonโt so much as flinch at a humanโs approach. You can pick one up off a leaf, hold it in your hand, play with it, put it in your little sisterโs hair, whatever. Hell, they can barely fly; itโs more of a prolonged, hopeful lunge in the right direction. The worst they can do is careen into you midflight, possibly with a comicalย โbonkโ sound, and flop to the ground hilariously. They are bad at everything.
Except for one thing: YELL. Cicadas are here because it is Yelling Time. Now is the Time To Yell and by god thatโs what theyโre going to do and dear lord are they good at it. In a cicada year their atmospheric background hum quickly ramps up from โanime foleyโ to โneighbor mowing their lawnโ to โdrowning out a jet aircraft.โ Every piece of greenery becomes an auditory hazard generating noise in proportion to its size. Got a big hedge? Now you have THE LOUDEST HEDGE. Beautiful shade tree in the front yard? Canopy of YELL, with a side order of cronch as you step on discarded chrysalises, dead cicadas, and live ones that are too stupid to move. And given that theyโre about the thickness of a finger, stepping on one can be a gruesome experience. Donโt walk around barefoot, is what Iโm saying.
Thus for a few glorious weeks every seventeenth May the outdoors is ruled by screaming idiot bugs flapping around without a care in the world. The Yell functions as the worldโs loudest matchmaking service to help the cicadas steadily pair off and mate. Then the females buzz away to lay their eggs on tree branches, the males probably get eaten now that theyโve served their purpose,ย and the shouting hedges gradually go quiet. The silent epilogue plays out a couple months later when the eggs hatch and the translucent white nymphs drop from the branches to burrow into soil and sleep, sipping from tree roots and catching up on their Netflix queue, for another 17 years.ย
In conclusion, hereโs Sir David Attenborough catfishing a cicada:
Fly free, you beautiful dumbasses. Fly free.
snowghoul
theartofmadeline
