Cicadas wear their old skin when they emerge

They spend years underground, then pop up wearing their old clothes

By Smartasaurus· 1 min read Wild

Imagine spending seventeen years in total darkness

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They spend years underground, then pop up wearing their old clothes
The noise that follows is louder than a lawnmower.
The tiny hatchlings that emerge from those branches don't fly; they simply let go, falling like dust to the ground and digging immediately into the…

Can a creature spend seventeen years in total darkness only to die five weeks after seeing the sun? Periodical cicadas live most of their lives as pale, wingless nymphs, tunneling through the soil and sucking fluid from tree roots in a decade-long subterranean trance.

They aren't hibernating. They are counting the years by tracking the ebb and flow of fluid inside the roots they feed on, waiting for a thermal signal from the soil above. When the ground hits exactly 64 degrees Fahrenheit (18 degrees Celsius), billions of them crawl out simultaneously in a synchronized emergence that overwhelms every predator in the forest.

Their transformation is a violent structural renovation. Once they claw their way onto a tree trunk, their golden-brown exoskeleton splits down the middle. A soft, white adult pushes itself out of its own back, unfurling wings that look like stained glass. Within hours, their new skin hardens into a black armor, and their eyes turn a vivid, blood-red.

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