How long is the life span of cicadas?

Cicadas usually live in temperate to tropical regions of the world, and a few are distributed in desert areas. they are the general name of insects of the family Cicadellidae, Hemiptera. Larvae live in the soil and belong to incomplete metamorphosis insects. Larvae feed on plant roots and adults eat plant juices. Let's take a look at how long cicadas live.

How long is the life span of cicadas

The life cycle of different species of cicadas is also different. Most French cicadas have a life cycle of 4 years, while North America has cicadas with a lifespan of up to 17 years. Chinese cicadas mostly live in 3 to 7 years, of which nearly half are 5 years. A few can survive 8 to 9 years.

What food does the cicada eat?

Cicada larvae live in the soil, using piercing mouthparts to suck plant root sap, usually stay in the soil for several years or even more than ten years, such as 3 years, 5 years, and 17 years. Adults sing in trees in summer and use needles to suck up sap as food.

The vocal principle of cicadas

The singing cicada is a male cicada, with the speaker at the base of the abdomen, like a big drum covered with a layer of tympanic membrane, the tympanic membrane vibrates and makes a sound, because the singing muscle can stretch about 10,000 times per second, and the gap between the cover plate and the tympanic membrane can resonate, so its sound is particularly loud, and can take turns to use a variety of different tones to sing loudly. The musical instrument of the female cicada is incomplete and cannot make sound, so it is a "dumb cicada".

The growth process of cicadas

1. Cicada eggs: from June to July every year, cicadas change from pupae to adults and then lay eggs in a short period of a few days. the eggs are at the peak of hatching from late May to early June, and the hatching activities end in late June. Most of them hatch in the daytime and afternoon, accounting for about 80%. The night hatching is less, about 20%, and the egg period is close to 300 days.

2. Larvae: cicada larvae live in the soil, have a pair of strong digging forefeet, suck sap at the roots of host plants, and are less active. They usually stay in the soil for several years or even more than ten years, and the temperature drops after autumn. then drill into the deep soil for the winter, and then move upward to the tree roots after the spring is warm, with the largest number of nymphs in the soil in May of the year.

3. Adults: the mature larvae of cicadas emerged from the soil from late May to mid-August and molted into adults. The peak period of adults was from the middle of June to the middle of July, and the last ten days of October was the last stage. About 20 days after emergence, the adults began to lay eggs in late June, the peak spawning period was from the end of June to late August, and the last spawning period was from the first ten days of September to the first ten days of October.