A while back I went collecting with a friend in one of my favorite places in Arizona right when the very large cicadas in the area (Tibicen cultriformis) were active.   You could hear their grand songs sweeping up the canyon every few minutes, like the auditory equivalent of the wave at a baseball game, each one picking up the song from its neighbor and passing it along.  Those cicadas were enormous, so I was delighted when I found some shed exoskeletons from the nymphs clinging to my favorite tree.  I brought a few home and photographed one of them from several different angles.  Just for fun, I combined all the shots into one a few days ago (click on the image to enlarge it greatly):

I kinda like the way this looks.  What do you all think – kinda fun?  Or kinda creepy?

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