{"id":5100,"date":"2014-11-19T20:32:27","date_gmt":"2014-11-20T03:32:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/?p=5100"},"modified":"2026-02-09T09:29:01","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T16:29:01","slug":"which-fungus-attacks-magicicadas-massospora-cicadina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/which-fungus-attacks-magicicadas-massospora-cicadina\/","title":{"rendered":"Which fungus attacks Magicicadas? Massospora cicadina"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The fungus Massospora cicadina preys on Magicicadas cicadas. This is particularly interesting because the fungus is able to prey upon them in spite of their long 17 year life cycle (apparently fungi are not phased by prime numbers). <\/p>\n<p>When the fungus destroys the abdomen of male cicadas, they will behave like female cicadas and flick their wings in response to the songs of male cicadas, and attempt to mate with other males.<\/p>\n<p>A photo by Roy Troutman from Brood XIV (2008):<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/img_2027_cropped.jpg\" alt=\"Magicicada with Massospora. Roy Troutman. Brood XIV.\" width=\"600\" height=\"369\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-12982\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/img_2027_cropped.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/03\/img_2027_cropped-300x185.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Two photos by Dan Mozgai from Brood II (2013):<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Male-Magicicada-septendecim-infected-with-Massospora-cicadina-fungus.jpg\" alt=\"Male Magicicada septendecim infected with Massospora cicadina fungus\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-13147\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Male-Magicicada-septendecim-infected-with-Massospora-cicadina-fungus.jpg 800w, https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Male-Magicicada-septendecim-infected-with-Massospora-cicadina-fungus-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/05\/Male-Magicicada-septendecim-infected-with-Massospora-cicadina-fungus-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/Magicicada-septendecim-with-Massosporan-fungus-found-at-the-Edison-Memorial-Tower-Park-in-Edison-NJ.jpg\" alt=\"Magicicada septendecim with Massosporan fungus found at the Edison Memorial Tower Park in Edison NJ\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-11308\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/Magicicada-septendecim-with-Massosporan-fungus-found-at-the-Edison-Memorial-Tower-Park-in-Edison-NJ.jpg 640w, https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/Magicicada-septendecim-with-Massosporan-fungus-found-at-the-Edison-Memorial-Tower-Park-in-Edison-NJ-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 640px) 100vw, 640px\" \/><\/p>\n<h2>Magicicada fungus (massospora cicadina)<\/h2>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/player.vimeo.com\/video\/20998370\" width=\"640\" height=\"480\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; fullscreen\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/vimeo.com\/20998370\">magicicada fungus (massospora cicadina)<\/a> from <a href=\"https:\/\/vimeo.com\/user1091845\">Roy Troutman<\/a> on <a href=\"https:\/\/vimeo.com\">Vimeo<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>New from 2017: the Massospora cicadina viewed under a microscope.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The fungus Massospora cicadina preys on Magicicadas cicadas. This is particularly interesting because the fungus is able to prey upon them in spite of their long 17 year life cycle (apparently fungi are not phased by prime numbers). When the fungus destroys the abdomen of male cicadas, they will behave like female cicadas and flick [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[281,2,332,1055],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faqs","category-magicicada","category-massospora","category-matt-kasson"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5100"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5100\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21572,"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5100\/revisions\/21572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cicadamania.com\/cicadas\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}