Cicadas belonging to the genus Magicicada—having lived underground as nymphs for seventeen years—dig their way out of the soil in near synchrony, climb up nearby trees and shed their exoskeletons. As fully fledged adult cicadas, they hecticly seek out mates, lay their eggs and then die. This whole series of events, from emergence to death, takes only a few weeks. Here, a line of molted cicada exoskeletons remain gripped to a tree in Rock Creek Park, Washington, DC.