“Peeing in jets allows cicadas to generate a large volume of liquid excretion,” bioengineer/biophysicist Elio Challita told Popular Science. “This is critical because these insects must ingest a substantial amount of xylem-sap daily. So they need to excrete large volumes as well.”
[Related: How bug ‘wranglers’ help document the lives of flies, dung beetles, and more.]
