Details
Age level: All ages
Call 615-862-4187 or register by email [email protected]
The emergences of 13-year (southern) and 17-year (northern) periodical cicada broods in eastern forests of North America have many impacts on local food chains and food webs. In addition to aerating the forest soil when they emerge and adding fertilizer to that soil after they die, the sudden presence of these nutritious, easily preyed-upon insects affects a number of other species. For example, birds that prey on insects, both migratory and non-migratory, shift from feeding on moth and butterfly caterpillars to feeding on periodical cicada adults. Higher numbers of caterpillars survive to eat more tree leaves. Birds and other animals, as opportunistic and naïve predators, consume a steady supply of periodical cicadas. Migratory birds carry the extra energy they acquire to their destinations so a periodical cicada emergence has a direct effect even on these distant communities. Live cicadas of Brood XIX of the 13-year periodical cicadas will be present at the May 18 International Migratory Bird Day event at Bells Bend Park, so we should be able to observe local and migratory bird species feeding on the cicadas.