Iowa will be abuzz this summer as two special cicada broods emerge after being burrowed for nearly two decades.
Why it matters: The 13- and 17-year-old cicadas are some of the longest-living insects in the world.
- “I think it shows a healthy ecosystem,” Robin Pruisner, the state’s entomologist, tells Axios. “There are a lot of ways that a 17-year-long lifespan of an insect could go wrong. And here they are still coming through.”
State of play: The two cicadas, Broods XIX and XIII, will both peak between May and June as they mate and lay eggs around wooded areas.
How it works: Cicadas spend their juvenile stages burrowed underground, growing from the size of a small ant to their larger 1.5-inch-long adult bodies as they feast on tree roots.
- They emerge ready to mate and lay eggs.
- The numbers can leave people squeamish, reaching over one million cicadas an acre — a way to survive against predators by sheer volume, known as ” predator satiation. ”
Reality check: They don’t bite or sting and are not an agricultural threat, Pruisner says.