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In Iowa, as animals change their diets to feast on the once-in-a-lifetime double emergence of cicadas, scientists shift their research to gather rare data.
Updated
If you havenโt yet heard it, youโve likely heard about it: the rare double-emergence of periodic cicada broods, currently taking place from Georgia to Wisconsin. The last time Brood XIX (which surfaces from the ground every 13 years) and Brood XIII (on a 17-year cycle) arrived at the same time, Thomas Jefferson was incorrectly referring to them as an unusual breed of โlocusts.โ
Actually their own superfamily of insects, these cicadas have been hiding just below the soilโs surface nearly their whole lives, feeding on sap from tree roots. Now nearing their final days, theyโre coming out into the open to molt their adolescent skins, mate, and lay eggs in the tips of tree branches before dying.
Much has been made of the nuisance caused by their incessant mating calls (reaching over 90 decibels, the approximate volume of a lawnmower) and the blanket of exoskeletons they leave behind. But the beneficial side effects of a cicada emergence deserve equal air time. Their tunnels aerate the soil, increasing the amount of water it can store. The โflagging,โ or dying of branch tips, that occur as females lay eggs below the bark, is a form of natural pruning, creating strong limbs and larger fruits for the tree. And next year, those trillions of decomposing insect bodies will have nourished the soil, resulting in a markedly lusher environment.
Periodic cicadas may only appear once in a great while, but the entire ecosystem has been waiting for them.
Just as a cicada emergence will prompt some animals to change their diets and feast exclusively on the insects while theyโre here, the appearance of a brood of cicadas causes some biologists to temporarily shift their research areas.
โIโve been in the fields almost the whole time, every day โ including every day Memorial Day weekend. Iโm very tired,โ says Dr. Andrew Forbes, a scientist at the University of Iowa. Usually, he focuses on the interaction of parasitic insects with their host species. For the past few weeks, however, he and a team of students have been working full-time to transport thousands of cicadas from the 485-acre Macbride Nature Recreation Area (MNRA) in Solon, Iowa, to Pappy Dickens Preserve, a much smaller preserve just 1ยฝ miles from downtown Iowa City.ย
Itโs a warm, late May afternoon โ still early enough in the emergence that conversation can be heard over the mating calls โ when I meet up with Dr. Forbes in MNRA. Heโs been collecting cicadas at a nearby creek, with the help of his students and a team of AmeriCorps volunteers whoโve donated their time for the morning, and is hunting for the next dayโs gathering locations.
As we walk, Dr. Forbes explains that despite being within the range of Brood XIII in 2007, he was disappointed to discover the lack of cicadas in Iowa City โ including in Pappy Dickens and a bordering park. โI had some friends in geography, and they furnished me with a number of historic maps. They started doing flyover maps in 1930, so you can see what the landscape looked like approximately 70 years after Europeans started moving through, and itโs basically all pasture and cropland.โ
In other words, local cicadas had been decimated by human development. Considering that the insects travel only about 55 to 110 yards per generation, and the lack of continuous, untouched woodlands in Iowa (which ranks first in the nation in the amount of land used for planting crops), it is unlikely that a periodic population could ever re-establish itself naturally in the cityโs geographically isolated parks.
Dr. Forbes wants to see if, with focused intervention, scientists might assist a population in returning to their natural habitat โ or if the consequences of human action has meant that cicadas (along with all their environmental benefits, and their extraordinary once-in-two-decade mating display) will be confined to whatever pristinely preserved land is left.
โWeโve released almost 13,000 now. We got another couple thousand this morning, and I think weโll try one more time tomorrow and hopefully get up to 20,000 and then see if it works,โ Forbes says.
By mimicking an adaptation called โpredator satiation,โ Dr. Forbes hopes to give the transported cicadas the best possible chance at survival. Cicada broods survive by emerging in droves: even with predators eating their fill, enough cicadas remain to mate for the next generation. Whether Dr. Forbesโ hypothesis will work with his transplanted insects remains to be seen.
โIโm losing a lot of sleep โฆ I admit I would be sad if it doesnโt work,โ Dr. Forbes confides. But it wonโt be long before the team begins observing results. Within days, they should be able to notice the first sign that the population is settling in their new home: that tell-tale drone of the male cicada, calling out for a mate.
You donโt have to be a scientist to assist with cicada research, though. For those racing to study the emergence before the insects return underground in late June, the ubiquitousness of smartphones provides a powerful new tool that wasnโt available when Brood XIII last emerged.
Apps like iNaturalist and Cicada Safari allow nature enthusiasts to upload photographs of their sightings to online databases, which record the exact time and location the photograph was taken. With enough photographs, a detailed distribution map will emerge, spanning the entire life cycle, from emergence to descent โ information that is invaluable to researchers, considering the rarity with which cicadas can be studied in the wild.
Land managers and conservationists are relying on this data, too, using it as a marker to determine whether measures theyโve taken โ such as cleaning MNRA by hand after a 2020 derecho destroyed a quarter of Iowaโs forest land, instead of using heavy machinery โ have been sufficient to preserve various insects and plants that live primarily underground. This will be vital to future conservation efforts, as climate change continues to bring larger and more frequent storms to the area.
For Dr. Forbes, though, itโs just as important that the public has a chance to experience the rare event and appreciate the specialness of what is occurring. โJust like for the eclipse โ people put it on their calendars and they went to find a place they can see the eclipse โ this is another amazing natural phenomenon,โ he told Iowa Public Radioโs Charity Nebbe on a recent episode of Garden Variety. โI would encourage people to go find a place where the cicadas are still there, and check them out โ it will be a real experience.โ
After all, itโll be more than two centuries before Brood XIX and Brood XIII emerge at the same time again. Itโs up to us to make sure theyโre still protected, come 2245.
Update: I corresponded with Dr. Forbes via email a week after our meeting, and he shared, disappointingly, that it seems few of the cicadas that were moved to Pappy Dickens survived predators. This tells scientists that for predator satiation to work, the number of cicadas must be in the millions, not thousands.
On a brighter note, he wrote that the Universityโs mapping of the insects in a different nearby town has identified a โsouthward-moving slow recolonizationโ of Brood XIII cicadas, through former cropland thatโs been rewilded. To Dr. Forbes, this offers โsome hope that the regrowth of forests โ and a whole lot of time โ can get even the slowest-dispersing animals back to their original ranges.โ
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How university students re-imagined parking spaces in the heart of downtown Toronto. Read the story.
What you didn’t know about ladybugs, butterflies, bees and hummingbirds, and how you can be a good global citizen by planting for them. Read the story.
The iconic park celebrates its 150th birthday this year with plans to protect it for another 150 years. Read the story.
An ambitious (and replicable) program in Vermont turns surplus food into delicious meals for the hungry, ensuring that nothing goes to waste. Read the story.
Once considered unswimmable, the Willamette has found new life as a popular swimming and kayaking destination. Read the story.
