These noisy bugs will soon become brainwashed horndogs.
A creepy sexually transmitted fungus has taken over the bodies of millions of cicadas, turning them into sexual “zombies” and is expected to spread across parts of the United States this spring, scientists say.
A horror-movie-esque fungal pathogen known as Massospora cicadina will cause insects to mate like crazy in parts of the Southeast and Midwest — noisy insects emerging from the ground in record numbers. While doing so, experts told CBS News.
The fungus bursts a chalky white plug from the insect’s back, taking over its brain and causing its reproductive organs to fall off.
It then acts as a “puppet master”, pumping adrenaline into excited men so that they can pretend to be women and infect them through sex.
“So this fungus can be transmitted sexually. So it spreads like a sexually transmitted disease,” Matthew Casson, associate professor of mycology and forest pathology at West Virginia University, told CBS Told.
“There is hyper-sexualized behavior. So, for example, the male will keep trying to mate with the female, but again, their back end is a fungus, so they fail,” he said.
“But they also pretend to be women to attract men. And the number of cicadas an infected person comes into contact with doubles.”
Periodic cicadas spend most of their lives underground, emerging every 13 or 17 years, depending on the species.
This year, two species of cicadas will likely emerge from late April to June, marking the first time in more than 200 years that trillions of cicadas will flock to the state at the same time.
Brood XIX appears in states such as Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Tennessee, and Virginia.
In contrast, Brood XIII appears in Illinois, Iowa, and Wisconsin.
Casson said both species are vulnerable to this strange infection.
“The cicadas continue their normal activities as they do when they’re healthy,” Casson said. “They fly around and walk on plants, like they’re trying to mate. But a third of their bodies have been replaced by fungi. It’s really weird.”
Male cicadas generally make loud noises to attract female mates, while female insects move their wings to signal that they want to keep busy.
However, the zombie fungus causes males to seek out relationships with members of the same sex.
It’s unclear whether this infection affects other wildlife or humans, Casson said, but thousands of compounds could become infected cicadas.
“We know that many animals, including snakes and birds, prey on emerging cicadas. Could it be affecting the animals that eat them? Yes, it is possible.”
Scientists believe that the fungal spores may have been dormant in the soil before infecting cicadas underground.
Overall, less than 5% of the trillions of cicadas expected to emerge are likely to become infected with the fungus, he said.
Researchers have not identified any other forms of impact on wildlife.
