Cicadas

When you visit in the Summer months, you would be forgiven for thinking that a bunch of us are just sitting around in the sun.
Chances are you may be right or we may be watching another of Nature's marvels at work
(and sometimes this takes time)

    With there being about 2,500 species of cicada around the world, with more than 200 being in Australia, then chances are that you have already witnessed this metamorphosis and understand the attraction.

Australian cicadas differ from many other types because of our diversity of climate and terrain. Here cicadas are found on tropical islands and cold coastal beaches around Tasmania; in tropical wetlands; high and low deserts; alpine areas of New South Wales and Victoria; large cities like Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane; and Tasmanian highlands and snowfields.

The drone of cicadas is one of Australia's most recognisable sounds of summer. Cicadas are the loudest insects in the world

It is thought that the sound produced by some communal species can act as a defence against predatory birds and some are even loud enough (120 decibels) to be painful to the human ear. Cicadas also often sing in chorus, which makes it more difficult for a predator to locate an individual.
Some sing in the daytime and others at dusk.

Some large species such as the Greengrocer/Yellow Monday and the Double Drummer produce a noise in excess of 120 dB (this is approaching the pain threshold of the human ear). In contrast, some small species have songs so high in pitch that the noise is beyond the range of our hearing.
After mating, the female cuts slits into the bark of a twig, and into these she deposits her eggs. (This may be several hundred eggs).
When the eggs hatch, the newborn nymphs drop to the ground, where they burrow.
Most cicadas go through a life cycle that lasts from two to five years.

Cicadas live underground as nymphs for most of their lives, at depths ranging from about 30 cm down to 2.5 m . The nymphs feed on root juice and have strong front legs for digging.

In the final nymphal instar, they construct an exit tunnel to the surface and emerge. They then molt (shed their skins), on a nearby plant for the last time and emerge as adults. The abandoned skins remain, still clinging to the bark of trees.

 
Cicada facts:

    * Only male cicadas sing. They do this in an attempt to find a mate.
    * Different species have different songs to attract only their own kind.
    * Adult cicadas have short lives, usually only a few weeks.
    * Cicadas feed only on plant sap using their piercing, sucking mouthparts.
    * Cicadas feed on a huge range of plants, including eucalypts and grasses.
    * Birds, bats, spiders, wasps, ants, mantids and tree crickets all prey on cicadas.

Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Arthropoda
Class:	Insecta
Order:	Hemiptera
Suborder:	Auchenorrhyncha
Infraorder:	Cicadomorpha
Superfamily:	Cicadoidea
Family:	Cicadidae