Some of the reading I did while caring for Flicky concerned keeping cut branches alive. It’s one thing to keep leaves green in a vase and another to know whether the branch is still suitable for a cicada to feed from. A rather fiddly problem to have.

The trouble was that a branch could look perfectly healthy while I had no real idea what was happening to the xylem inside it. Putting it in water might help prevent it from drying out, but whether that meant Flicky could continue feeding from it was another question entirely.

I was trying to understand how water travelled through the tree, what happened once a branch was cut and how long it might remain useful. I was also trying to work out whether some types of trees would be better suited to her than others.

I’d started out wanting to keep a little cicada comfortable, and now I was spending an extraordinary amount of time thinking about trees. Of course I’d already given Flicky branches to climb around and feed from. The question was whether those cut branches were still providing anything she could drink, even when the leaves looked perfectly healthy.

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