Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth
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Not SyncedIf you live on the east coast
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Not Syncedof the United States,
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Not Syncedyou spent the last 17 years of your life
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Not Syncedwalking,
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Not Syncedeating,
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Not Syncedand sleeping
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Not Syncedabove a dormant army of insects.
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Not SyncedThese are the cicadas.
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Not SyncedEvery 17 years,
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Not Syncedbillions of them emerge from the ground
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Not Synceddue to three things:
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Not Syncedmolt,
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Not Syncedmate,
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Not Syncedand die.
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Not SyncedThere are fifteen different breeds of cicadas out there,
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Not Syncedgrouped by when they'll emerge from the ground.
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Not SyncedSome of these broods are on a 13-year cycle,
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Not Syncedothers are on a 17-year clock.
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Not SyncedEither way, the cicadas live underground
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Not Syncedfor most of their lives,
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Not Syncedfeeding on the juices of plant roots.
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Not SyncedWhen it's time to emerge,
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Not Syncedthe adults will begin to burrow their way
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Not Syncedout of the ground
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Not Syncedand up to the surface,
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Not Syncedwhere they will live for just a few weeks.
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Not SyncedDuring these weeks, though,
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Not Syncedeverybody will know the cicadas have arrived.
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Not SyncedThere will be billions of them
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Not Syncedand they're loud.
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Not SyncedMale cicadas band together t
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Not Syncedto call for female mates,
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Not Syncedand their collective chorus can reach
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Not Syncedup to 100 decibels,
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Not Syncedas loud as a chain saw.
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Not SyncedIn fact, if you happen to be using a chain saw
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Not Syncedor a lawn mower,
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Not Syncedmale cicadas will flock to you,
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Not Syncedthinking you're one of them.
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Not SyncedNow, like most things in nature,
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Not Syncedthe cicadas don't arrive without a posse.
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Not SyncedThere're all sort of awesome and gross parasites
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Not Syncedthat come along with the buzzing bugs.
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Not SyncedTake the fungus massospora for example.
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Not SyncedThis little white fungus buries itself
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Not Syncedin the cicadas abdomen and eats the bug alive,
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Not Syncedleaving behind its spores.
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Not SyncedWhen those spores rupture,
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Not Syncedthey burst out of the still-alive cicada,
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Not Syncedturning the bug into a flying salt shaker of death,
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Not Syncedraining spores down upon its unsuspecting cicada neighbors.
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Not SyncedBut while we know pretty precisely
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Not Syncedwhen the cicadas will arrive and fade away,
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Not Syncedwe're still not totally certain why.
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Not SyncedThere are certain advantages
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Not Syncedto having your entire species emerge at once, of course.
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Not SyncedThe sheer number of cicadas coming out of the ground
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Not Syncedis so overwhelming to predators,
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Not Syncedit is essentially guaranteed
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Not Syncedthat a few bugs will survive and reproduce.
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Not SyncedAnd since cicadas emerge
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Not Syncedevery 13 or 17 years,
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Not Syncedlonger than the lifespan of many of their predators,
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Not Syncedthe animals that eat them
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Not Synceddon't learn to depend on their availability.
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Not SyncedBut why 13 and 17 years
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Not Syncedinstead of 16,
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Not Syncedor 18,
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Not Syncedor 12?
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Not SyncedWell, that part no one really knows.
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Not SyncedIt's possible the number just happened by chance,
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Not Syncedor, perhaps, cicadas really love prime numbers.
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Not SyncedEventually, the cicadas will mate and slowly die off,
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Not Syncedtheir call fading into the distance.
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Not SyncedThe eggs that they lay will begin the cycle again,
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Not Syncedtheir cicada babies burrowing into the earth,
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Not Syncedfeeding on plant juice,
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Not Syncedand waiting for their turn
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Not Syncedto darken the skies
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Not Syncedand fill the air with their songs.
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Not SyncedIn 17 years, they'll be ready.
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Not SyncedWill you?
- Title:
- Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth
- Description:
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View full lesson: http://ed.ted.com/lessons/cicadas-the-dormant-army-beneath-your-feet-rose-eveleth
Every 13 or 17 years, billions of cicadas emerge from the ground to molt, mate and die. Adult cicadas only live a few weeks above ground, but you'd be hard pressed to ignore them -- they are extremely loud! Rose Eveleth explains everything you need to know about these noisy insects, admitting that there's still some things we just don't understand.
Lesson by Rose Eveleth, animation by Eli Enigenburg.
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TED-Ed
- Duration:
- 02:46
Krystian Aparta commented on English subtitles for Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth | ||
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth | ||
TED edited English subtitles for Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth | ||
Jenny Zurawell edited English subtitles for Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth | ||
Jessica Ruby approved English subtitles for Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth | ||
Jessica Ruby accepted English subtitles for Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth | ||
Jessica Ruby edited English subtitles for Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth | ||
Jessica Ruby edited English subtitles for Cicadas: The dormant army beneath your feet - Rose Eveleth |
Krystian Aparta
The English transcript was updated on 3/9/2016.