07-04-2025
- General
- National Geographic
Cicadas are back—and this time it's the ‘mother of all broods'
The last time the periodical cicadas known as Brood XIV emerged, Netflix was still sending DVDs through the mail, people were buying ringtones for their Blackberries, and Barack Obama was about to be elected president of the United States.
Seventeen years later, the world is a very different place. But for periodical cicadas, which spend more than a decade underground as nymphs before emerging in one giant wave as winged adults, it's business as usual.
Periodical cicadas in Springfield, Illinois. Researchers now know more about these insects, thanks to genetics and mapping efforts, but much of their knowledge is also based on historical records.
Photograph By John Stanmeyer, Nat Geo Image Collection
'Brood XIV is the same brood that was first recorded in 1634 by the pilgrims in the Plymouth colony,' says Gene Kritsky, professor emeritus at Mount St. Joseph College in Ohio, who's been studying cicadas for more than 50 years. 'And there it is, still emerging in Plymouth.'
