Climate change could be impacting emergence of cicadas
As billions of cicadas emerge from the ground across 16 states in the Southeast and Midwest, scientists are noticing a possible impact from climate change. Since the periodical cicadas that crawl out of the ground are triggered by soil temperature, and since temperatures are rising more quickly in the spring and early summer, the insects, once known for being notoriously predictable, are emerging more than two weeks earlier than usual.