Hello, I’m Amanda McNulty with Clemson Extension and Making It Grow. Naturalist Austin Jenkins talked to us recently about the periodic cicada emergence in South Carolina. Our state’s cicadas that will come out in huge numbers in the Piedmont are on a thirteen-year cycle.
Thirteen years ago, the nymphs emerged from twigs where females laid eggs, fell to the ground, and burrowed into the soil. They attached themselves to tree roots and inserted their proboscis (mouth part) into the xylem portion of the tree’s vascular system. Xylem brings water from the soil to the tree --so not much nutrition there; which is why these cicadas take so long to reach adulthood. Finally, after the last molt, they emerge from the soil, attach themselves to a tree, their exoskeleton splits open and the adult emerges, fly upward into trees, mate, and it all starts again.
