This story was originally published in the June 2016 issue of Wonderful West Virginia. To subscribe, visit wonderfulwv.com.
Love them or hate them, billions of these strange creatures appeared in West Virginia in 2016.
Imagine it’s late spring in Virginia, sometime in the 17th century. You and your family, colonists from England, have survived your first winter. And after the last of the snow comes the first tree buds, the first planting, the first lambs, and the promise of summer to come.
Until, one night after a warm rain, something almost otherworldly drags itself out of the earth outside your cabin. First one, then 10, then hundreds, then thousands, then too many to count—a horde of shiny, amber-colored, bulbous-eyed creatures. They climb trees, shed their skins, and flit through the sky on lacy, gossamer wings, in unison emitting a pulsing, buzzing
cacophony like you’ve never heard.
To you, a newcomer to the wild North American landscape, it would have seemed as if the demons of your nightmares had come to life. That’s why, for many years, these creatures were incorrectly labeled as “locusts,” says Berry Crutchfield, plant and pest biologist with the West Virginia Department of Agriculture—as in the same biblical locusts that terrorized slave-holding pharaohs in the Old Testament and the same creatures that are supposed to signal the end of the world in the New Testament. They were creatures of ill omen and calamitous prophesy. “But these aren’t true locusts,” Crutchfield explains. “The early settlers, when they first saw these insects emerging, had no other frame of reference for them, so they associated them with the locust plagues in the Bible.”
Of course the world did not end with this buzzing phenomenon—one that had already been going on for millennia unbeknownst to Europeans—nor did it end when the phenomenon occurred again and again in the following decades. Today, these creatures, now relabeled periodical cicada or Magicicada, are some of the most talked about, studied, misunderstood, mysterious, and, even still, dreaded on Earth. And in spring 2016 they emerged in West Virginia.
From Here to There
Unlike true locusts, which are a species of grasshopper, Magicicada are a genus of plant-eating insect native only to eastern North America. They exist in the same order as aphids and leafhoppers.
image courtesy of Cicada Mania
Periodical cicadas, so named because of their cyclical emergences from the ground, come in two types: a group of four species that appear in spring every 13 years and a group of three species that appear in spring every 17 years. The type that emerged in West Virginia in 2016 was a 17-year variety known as Brood V.
Not to be confused with annual cicada species, which emerge every year in the heat of July and August, periodical cicadas are composed of large groups called broods—billions strong—which appear in different regions in eastern North America in different years. How does one distinguish between annual and periodical cicadas? John Cooley, in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Connecticut and a cicada expert who regularly travels the country hunting down these emergences, says you’ll know it when you see it.
“There aren’t many phenomena as spectacular as this,” he says. “Most people can’t fathom the numbers. It’s in the millions per acre. Not like most summers, where you’ll see a couple of annual cicada here and there. This is a whole other ballgame.”
Cooley says these massive emergences are all about survival. Periodical cicadas in their adult form are large: 2 to just over 3 centimeters long. They have red eyes, black bodies with translucent wings shot through with orange veins, and bellies that can be black, orange, or striped depending on
the species. All in all, they’re just big juicy snacks to many predators—from birds to cats. They don’t bite, sting, pinch, or hide particularly well aboveground. But what they do have is numbers. “Periodicals are not subtle, but they don’t want to be. This is how they deal with predators. They simply overwhelm them, mate, and die,” Cooley says.
Their wide range and adaptability is another advantage. “The southernmost populations are in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. In the North, you’ll find them all the way into Iowa, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Some records have them in upstate New York,” he says. “It’s a funny species because you find them in the prairie and in the Appalachians.” Brood V, made up of three species—Magicicada cassinii, Magicicada septendecim, and Magicicada septendecula—will emerge in a vast area across West Virginia as well as in Maryland, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia by June this year. The last time this brood emerged was 1999. But Brood V isn’t the only one waiting in the wings. At least six other broods call the Mountain State home, and each will make an appearance in years to come—as early as 2019 for some species.
From Egg to Adult
Periodical cicadas start life as eggs laid inside V-shaped slits the mother cicadas cut into the bark of narrow tree branches. After six to 10 weeks, the newborn nymph cicadas emerge and drop out of the trees, burrowing into
the ground and living within two feet of the surface for the next 13 to 17 years. There, they use their piercing, sucking mouthparts, called probosces, to tap into tree roots and feed on tree fluids, a process that rarely harms
a well-established tree.
feeding on tree roots and preparing for emergence.
image courtesy of Cicada Mania
While underground, the cicadas dig tunnels, make cells to live in, and shed their skins and grow in preparation for that same mass migration to the surface their ancestors made. “For years they molt and become larger and larger. At the end, they emerge from the ground in spring and shed their skin a final time and turn into adults,” Crutchfield says. “That’s when the wings show up. Those adults are alive for only four to six weeks, and their main purpose is to mate and lay eggs.”
Male Magicicada are the ones to blame for the constant drone you hear at the park this year. Each species has a special call—from a “whee-oh” to something like a stadium full of televisions set to static. The males use these sounds to attract female mates. Once a pair finds their way to each other, despite being surrounded by millions of other cicadas looking for the same thing, they mate—females typically once, males many times—and separate. The females then leave to lay their eggs. And the cycle starts anew.
“For years they molt and become larger and larger. At the end, they emerge from the ground in spring and shed their skin a final time and turn into adults.”
Berry Crutchfield, West Virginia Department of Agriculture plat and pest biologist
From Bane to Beneficial
Despite humans’ long history with these insects, the Magicicada’s synchronous emergence remains a mystery even to the specialists who study it. Why and how did these cicada species develop the ability to time their emergence? Why wait exactly 17 or 13 years to emerge? And how do they know, often within hours or days of each other, when to come out? So far, we have few answers, which helps keep a swarm of superstitions alive and humming even today. “There’s still a popular old saying I hear all the time that the coming of the cicadas predicts the coming of war,” Crutchfield says, adding, “People always call our offices when we have a brood emerging because they’re afraid. They worry the insects could bite or sting. There’s an old tale about cicadas poisoning fruit. But it’s all false.”
What we do know is that cicadas have an important niche to fill in their ecosystems. Being parasites of trees, cicadas keep certain species in check and the insects’ egg-laying helps prune old or weak branches and saplings. They also provide a glut of food in early spring for predators and fertilize the soil as their bodies decompose. Even their movements underground,
tunneling and aerating the soil, benefit the trees and other subterranean creatures.
But for the Magicicada currently crawling their way into the light beneath our feet, their emergence is nothing more than the last leg of an incredible journey. They might be one of the longest-lived insects in the world, but after just a few short weeks of buzzing around blue skies, singing their hearts out, the most important legacy they’ll leave behind isn’t an omen or sign. It’s the hope of a next generation—holding fast in branches above our heads, waiting to be born.
written by Mikenna Pierotti