After a 17-year hiatus, billions of red-eyed insects are beginning to crawl their way above ground in portions of the United States and Dr. Michael Raupp, a Professor Emeritus of Entomology at the University of Maryland is ecstatic.
This report produced by Yahaira Jacquez.
Dr. Michael Raupp is a self-proclaimed cicada enthusiast.
Dr. Raupp: "I think they're some of the most beautiful creatures on the planet." So much so that he is OK with a cicada crawling on his face.
Now with a major emergence of these flying insects imminent, Dr. Raupp is downright ecstatic.
Dr. Raupp: "This is just a spectacular event.
I mean, there's nothing else like this on the entire planet Earth, even in the entire universe." These aren't your average summer cicadas.
These only come around every 17 years and they do everything bigger.
From Maryland to New York, billions are starting to emerge across the eastern United States this month.
And with so many, the noise they make will be much louder.
The hatch of these cicadas, called Brood X, happens as warming spring soil reaches a certain temperature.
Then, billions of cicada nymphs, which have been living off tree roots for 17 years, will crawl out of the ground, shed their skin, and start feeding and looking for mates.
But why so many?
Dr. Raupp says it's part of a bizarre survival strategy.
Dr. Raupp: "It's called predator satiation.
They're going to emerge in such massive numbers synchronously.
They'll fill the belly of every predator that wants to eat them and there will still be enough left over to perpetuate their species...Boom." The 1-1/2 inch-long black insects with iridescent wings and bright red eyes live above ground as adults for about three weeks - just long enough to reproduce before dying.
Once the cicadas mate, the females cut slits into trees, where they deposit up to 600 eggs.
The adults quickly die, but the eggs hatch a few weeks later to restart the cycle.
For Dr. Raupp, he says to not fear the cicadas, rather to embrace them.
"You don't have to go to Tanzania or Botswana for a safari, you can go right in your own backyard this year and go on a cicada safari.
There will be birth.
There will be death.
There will be romance in the treetops." After all - next time Brood X comes out won't be until 2038.
