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• Stewardship--The Solution for What Ails Ye

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The Magic Cicada

"The supernatural is the natural not yet understood." ~Elbert Hubbard

The Magic Cicada by Cynthia Sellers -- Cicadas are found all over the world but the Magic Cicada is only found right here in the eastern U.S. If you live on their turf, you probably already know the 17-yr periodical cicadas are out and mating this year. How can you not notice them when they're so loud? But if you hear anyone say we've been invaded by cicadas, be sure to set them straight on the facts. They've been here all along, just unseen. This particular batch, called Brood XIV of Magicicada septendecim, has been developing underground since before many young Tennesseeans were even a twinkle in their mother's eye. According to the USDA, Brood XIV stretches across Southern Ohio, Kentucky, Northern Tennessee, Massachusetts, Maryland, North Carolina, Southern Pennsylvania, Western parts of Virginia & W. Virginia, and to parts of New York & New Jersey!

Now if you hear anyone say their coming out is a bad omen, tell 'em this ain't the Dark Ages. If that were true, something bad would happen every 17 yrs like clockwork. ...Yet one look into those unwavering, red eyes and it's easy to see how they might have gotten a bad rap over the centuries. Those eyes are the eyes of a creature that's been around a long time. For a bug, that is.

Speaking of getting a bad rap... The Pilgrims of Plymouth Colony recorded observing them for the first time in 1633 or so and they were unknown to them (periodical cicadas are only indigenous to eastern North America). The Native Americans had seen them before, however, and were afraid of them. They warned the colonists that the periodical cicadas were an omen that sickness would befall them. Unfortunately, for the cicadas, it did. The pilgrims got sick that year and again the following year. So the Pilgrims dubbed the periodical cicada a locust, not in the scientific sense but rather, after the Biblical plague. That misnomer persists to this day.

Locusts are actually a type of grasshopper. A swarm of hungry locusts really can do a lot of damage to crops because if there's enough of a concentration, they may eat the leaves off. Cicadas are a minor nuisance by comparison. They don't bite, they don't attack, they're not poisonous, despite old myths to the contrary...they just make little slits in sapling tree branches and drink the sap. They lay their eggs there, which grow to a larvae about the size of grain of rice that eventually falls off and burrows underground. This minor wound could make a tree more susceptible to disease or other insects or may cause a small twig to fall off, but hey, that's the cycle of life. It's the way it's been for over a million years. We're only now beginning to understand just how interdependent the many species on this planet are. Using pesticides to kill off bugs, we're also discovering in some instances may do lasting harm to the larger ecosystem, and even to us. So if you feel a compulsion to protect your trees from cicadas this year, try covering them with light netting or burlap to keep the bugs off for a month or so. And if a cicada lands in your hair, no need to scream and run for the nearest priest for an exorcism. Just gently pry it off (they're kindof scratchy and hold on tight) and move it to a more appropriate perch (preferably not a human).

Of course, today we know more about cicadas now than our ancestors did. We know that many types of cicadas have different year cycles. Some come out every year and some come out every 2, 5, or 7 years. The ones that get our attention are usually the 13 and 17 yr periodical cicadas because they're so infrequent and conspicuous. But you've got to cut them some slack, they've kept a low profile for 99% of their lifespan and when they finally “arrive” they're mostly interested in finding a mate so that's what all the noise is about. While they're underground, they go through five stages of development before they finally emerge in the 13th or 17th year and then only then when it's a temperature of at least 64° Fahrenheit! After that they need consistently warm temperatures (68° Fahrenheit or more) to survive. If they come out during an early warm spell followed by weeks of extreme cold, they may not live long enough to drive us all crazy with their siren song. But when they're threatened by cold, here is where we see the inherent genius of the Magicicada genus. They're playing a [prime] numbers game, gambling on their odds of survival. Periodical cicadas belong to a genus--a category of behaviorally and biologically similar species--called Magicicada, which first appeared 1.8 million years ago during the glacial age when the climate of eastern North America was highly unpredictable. By evolving to stay underground as long as possible, their chances of emerging during a cold spell are greatly reduced. An additional advantage is that they hatch during prime numbered lengths of years so they're seldom emerging at the same time as their cousin cicadas. The 13 yr and 17 yr cicada will emerge at the same time only once every 221 years. Even if one generation is killed off by a cold year, there are many generations of Magicicada left underground, still to follow. Barring mass death by pesticides or other catastrophe, the odds are that cicadas will be back again, just like magic, and in droves!