Ever wonder what  that high pitched sound coming  from the trees while in Costa Rica usually around sunset in March and April. Well it comes from a bug called a Cicada or in Spanish Chicharra….here is a bit of information on them:

A cicada ( /sɪˈkeɪdə/ or /sɪˈkɑːdə/) is an insect of the order Hemiptera, suborder Auchenorrhyncha (which was formerly included in the now invalid order Homoptera), in the superfamily Cicadoidea, with large eyes wide apart on the head and usually transparent, well-veined wings. There are about 2,500 species of cicada around the world, and many of them remain unclassified. Cicadas live in temperate to tropical climates where they are among the most widely recognized of all insects, mainly due to their large size and unique sound. Cicadas are often colloquially called locusts,^[1] although they are unrelated to true locusts, which are a kind of grasshopper. Cicadas are related to leafhoppers and spittlebugs.

Cicadas are benign to humans under normal circumstances and do not bite or sting in a true sense, but may mistake a person’s arm or other part of their body for a tree or plant limb and attempt to feed.^[2] Cicadas have a long proboscis under their head which they insert into plant stems in order to feed on sap. It can be painful if they attempt to pierce a person’s skin with it, but it is unlikely to cause other harm. It is unlikely to be a defensive reaction and is a rare occurrence. It usually only happens when they are allowed to rest on a person’s body for an extended amount of time.

Cicadas can cause damage to several cultivated crops, shrubs, and trees, mainly in the form of scarring left on tree branches while the females lay their eggs deep in branches.^[3][4]

Many people around the world regularly eat cicadas. They are known to have been eaten in Ancient Greece as well as China, Malaysia, Burma, Latin America, and the Congo.^[5] Female cicadas are prized for being meatier.^[5] Shells of cicadas are employed in the traditional medicines of China.^[6]

Male cicadas have loud noisemakers called “tymbals” on the sides of the abdominal base. Their “singing” is not the stridulation (where one structure is rubbed against another) of many other familiar sound-producing insects like crickets: the tymbals are regions of the exoskeleton that are modified to form a complex membrane with thin, membranous portions and thickened “ribs”. Contracting the internal tymbal muscles produces a clicking sound as the tymbals buckle inwards. As these muscles relax, the tymbals return to their original position producing another click. The interior of the male abdomen is substantially hollow to amplify the resonance of the sound. A cicada rapidly vibrates these membranes, and enlarged chambers derived from the tracheae make its body serve as a resonance chamber, greatly amplifying the sound. The cicada modulates the sound by positioning its abdomen toward or away from the substrate. Additionally, each species has its own distinctive “song”.^[1]

Average temperature of the natural habitat for this species is approximately 29 °C (84 °F). During sound production, the temperature of the tymbal muscles was found to be slightly higher.^[11] Cicadas like heat and do their most spirited singing during the hotter hours of a summer day, in a roughly 24 hour cycle.

Although only males produce the cicadas’ distinctive sound, both sexes have tympana, which are membranous structures used to detect sounds and thus the cicadas’ equivalent of ears. Males can disable their own tympana while calling.^[12]

Some cicadas produce sounds up to 120 dB (SPL)^[12] , among the loudest of all insect-produced sounds.^[13] This is especially notable as their song is technically loud enough to cause permanent hearing loss in humans, should the cicada sing just outside the listener’s ear. Conversely, some small species have songs so high in pitch that the noise is inaudible to humans.^[5] Species have different mating songs to ensure they attract the appropriate mate. It can be difficult to determine from which direction(s) cicada song is coming, because the low pitch carries well and because it may, in fact, be coming from many directions at once, as cicadas in various trees all raise one another to make noise in unison. Although relatively loud, cicada song can be comforting and even hypnotic at times, as it is at its loudest during the hottest time of an already hot day.

In addition to the mating song, many species also have a distinct distress call, usually a somewhat broken and erratic sound emitted when an individual is seized. A number of species also have a courtship song, which is often a quieter call and is produced after a female has been drawn by the calling song

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Cicadidae

cicádidos (Cicadidae), conocidos vulgarmente como “chiquilichis”, ´´,cigarras, chicharras, o cícadas, o cocoas en su etapa ninfal, son una familia de insectos del orden Homoptera. Tienen una cabeza hipognata, pronoto pequeño y mesonoto desarrollado, tarsos de 1 a 3 artejos, poseen 2 pares de alas homogéneas y membranosas que pueden adquirir tonos transparentes o coloreados, en reposo de disponen en forma de tejadillo. Las cigarras pueden vivir tanto en climas templados como tropicales.

Es notorio el canto entonado por los machos para atraer a las hembras, producido por un aparato estridulatorio situado en los costados del primer segmento abdominal, que consta de membranas quitinosas llamadas timbales y de sacos con aire que funcionan como cajas de resonancia, emitiendo cada especie un sonido propio característico. Los órganos auditivos están ubicados en el tórax. Aunque el sonido es emitido a cualquier hora del día es más frecuente e intenso al anochecer y al amanecer.

Miden entre 15 y 65 milímetros de largo. Poseen una boca suctora que les permite alimentarse de savia de los árboles y otras plantas. Tienen un desarrollo vital completo que dura de 2 a 17 años, según la especie.

Ciclo de vida

Cigarra abriendo sus alas, al salir de tierra.

Muda de una cigarra.

• Las hembras ponen sus huevos y mueren poco después.
• Los insectos jóvenes (o ninfas) caen al suelo y penetran en la tierra.
• Las ninfas viven dentro de la tierra de 4 a 17 años (dependiendo de la especie) y se alimentan de la savia de las raíces.
• Después de ese período, cavan túneles, suben a los árboles y sufren una muda, transformándose en adultos con alas y genitalia desarrollada listos para el apareamiento.
• El apareamiento tiene lugar generalmente durante los meses cálidos, aunque la época varía según la especie y la región. Varias especies se aparean en una misma época lo que produce un fenómeno sonoro peculiar, durante unas dos semanas de cantos ensordecedores, apareamientos y puesta de huevos.
• Los machos pueden llegar a morir debido a la diferencia de presión sonora producida por un aparato estridulatorio situado en los costados del primer segmento abdominal, que consta de membranas quitinosas llamadas timbales y de sacos con aire que funcionan como cajas de resonancia.

Informacion de Wikipedia