the Way of the Turtle

FIREFLIES
1.8 Mile Walk Around the Pine Hills Neighborhoods
Thursday, July 14, 2016

Thought I was seeing things at first, but there was a bunch of fireflies blinking on and off in a particularly thick section of bushes along edge of Ridgefield Park. At various points there has been concern about the decline in firefly populations - it certainly seems like there are fewer now than when I was much younger, but that could be purely an effect of memory - so I'm always pleased to see them and especially so here in the city.

A quick bit of research reveals that fireflies are actually a kind of beetle, and there are thousands of species around the world. In the US only the species in the east glow; the ones to the west use pheromones instead of light signals to attract mates. Larvae live for up to a year but the adults only last long enough to mate; apparently they are so short-lived that it's not clear what many species eat or if the adults even eat at all. For tons interesting firefly info check out www.firefly.org.

-JMH