When Cicadas Fall in Love

It is the nature of youth to make a racket. This happens reliably in New York City every weekday between two and three in the afternoon, when school lets out. Teen-agers spill onto the sidewalks and descend below ground into the subway, where, having loosened their uniforms and shed decorum, they occupy the airwaves—shouting, flirting, arguing, cajoling, checking in, checking out. They sing the song of themselves, loudly, jubilantly, to a rhythm that only they can hear.

In the coming days, the woods and lawns in and around the city will experience a similar visitation, from periodical cicadas. For seventeen years, juveniles of three species of the genus Magicicada have been underground, sipping on rootlets and quietly growing. When the soil reaches the right temperature—64 degrees F, measured eight inches down—they will emerge in astonishing numbers, molt, climb into the trees, and, for the remaining three weeks or so of their lives, sing an exoskeleton-rattling chorus. Periodical cicadas are distinct from the species that emerge annually, in far lesser numbers, and sing in the dog days of summer. (There are seven Magicicada species in all, four of which emerge, every thirteen years, in the Southern and Midwestern states; they seem to like prime numbers.) The reason for the long life cycle is the subject of debate, but the point of the din is clear: to court and mate and so start the period anew.

See the rest of the story at newyorker.com

Related:
An App to Find Nemo
The Life and Death of Miami Coral
Being a Better Online Reader