Letters

Do you remember fireflies, when the backyard filled with magical flickering lights on warm summer evenings? You watched in wonder and probably captured a few in a glass jar to show your parents.

These creatures seemed mystical and fascinating — but what is their vital role? How do they light up? And why are they disappearing now?

Fireflies are members of the Lampyridae family, a class of more than 2,000 species of soft-bodied beetles, many that emit light. In the United States, there are 170 species; they’re also called lightning bugs and glow worms.

Their lights are produced through a chemical interaction in a specialized light-emitting organ. Fireflies produce “cold light,” which makes them efficient light producers and the source of those bewitching night displays.

Fireflies are over 100 million years old and were long thought to have developed their ability to light up as a way to ward off predators. Scientists now know that both males and females flash their lights to signal mating. They spend one to two years as larvae, emerge as beetles, mate right away and die a few weeks later.

Most importantly, fireflies have proven vitally beneficial to gardeners, farmers and the agricultural industry. Fireflies spend 95 percent of their lives as larvae, which are voracious eaters. During the one-to-two-year span before emerging, the larvae feed on the worms, slugs, snails, cutworms, aphids and particularly the mosquito larvae that can destroy plants, vegetables and flowers, devastating gardens and farms. A garden visited by fireflies is a fortunate garden.

Unfortunately, starting in about 2010, the number of fireflies began to diminish. Unofficial reports claimed fewer sightings across the country; those magical evenings seemed to becoming a thing of the past. One study in 2021 found that over the prior five years more than 35 percent of fireflies in the U.S. had disappeared.

Entomologists have determined the major reasons for fireflies’ disappearance are the loss of their habitat, the increased use of pesticides and, not surprisingly, light pollution, which is believed to interrupt natural biorhythms and mating.

You can help stem this decline. Start by leaving an old log or two on your property and a bit of leaf litter under a tree where the larvae can develop. Or “leave the leaves” — instead of throwing away your bags of dead leaves in the fall, allow a pile to remain in your yard over the winter.

Turn off outside lights at night. Leave only necessary lights on, and turn off large “designer” lights.

Avoid the use of pesticides, especially lawn chemicals, which kill the firefly larvae that live in lawns and eat undesirable insects.

Let’s do what we can to keep fireflies thriving and useful.

Nancy Lombardi

Conservation Committee

Westhampton Garden Club