Light Up The Night!

1. How can you help fireflies live a full life?

Reduce your use of outdoor lighting

Create edge habitat between wooded areas and open grassy spaces

Limit pesticide use at your home

All of the above!

Check out this website to learn what scientists say about threats to firefly populations. Enjoy the glowing results!

Explanation

Check out this website to learn what scientists say about threats to firefly populations. Enjoy the glowing results!

2. What environmental factors threaten firefly survival?

Habitat loss

Light pollution

Pesticide use

All of the above

Habitat loss, light pollution, and pesticide use are the top three threats to firefly populations, but other environmental factors, including climate change, put these enchanting insects at risk.

Explanation

Habitat loss, light pollution, and pesticide use are the top three threats to firefly populations, but other environmental factors, including climate change, put these enchanting insects at risk.

3. What do scientists think the purpose of firefly flashing accomplishes?

Caution lights to avoid accidents

Attracting a mate

Morse code to communicate secret messages

Creating mood lighting for our summer evenings

Fireflies use flashes as mating signals. The flashes that you see in your yard are generally from males looking for females. If a female waiting in the grass or bushes likes what she sees, she responds back with a flash of her own. They will engage in this twinkling “conversation” until the male locates the female and they mate.

Explanation

Fireflies use flashes as mating signals. The flashes that you see in your yard are generally from males looking for females. If a female waiting in the grass or bushes likes what she sees, she responds back with a flash of her own. They will engage in this twinkling “conversation” until the male locates the female and they mate.

4. What are the larvae of fireflies called?

Glow Worms

Torches

Mag Lights

Night Lights

The Mills Brothers made the bouncy song "Glow Worm" famous back in 1953, but I'm not sure they were singing about this toxic insect larvae. The name is charming, but there's more to this story. Like all beetles, they undergo complete metamorphosis with four distinct stages: egg, larva, pupa, and adult. Firefly larvae are voracious predators of soft-bodied invertebrates. They typically hunt for their prey in moist soil or marshy areas, using their mandibles to inject prey with paralyzing neurotoxins. Once their quarry is immobilized, they secrete digestive enzymes that liquefy the prey before consumption.

Explanation

The Mills Brothers made the bouncy song "Glow Worm" famous back in 1953, but I'm not sure they were singing about this toxic insect larvae. The name is charming, but there's more to this story. Like all beetles, they undergo complete metamorphosis with four distinct stages: egg, larva, pupa, and adult. Firefly larvae are voracious predators of soft-bodied invertebrates. They typically hunt for their prey in moist soil or marshy areas, using their mandibles to inject prey with paralyzing neurotoxins. Once their quarry is immobilized, they secrete digestive enzymes that liquefy the prey before consumption.

5. What kind of insect is a firefly, also called a lightning bug?

A beetle

A fly

A "true bug"

A cockroach

Fireflies are actually beetles! Like other beetles, fireflies have a pair of hardened wing cases, called elytra, that the wings fold underneath. The elytra open for liftoff like gull-wing doors on a car, freeing the wings for flight.

Explanation

Fireflies are actually beetles! Like other beetles, fireflies have a pair of hardened wing cases, called elytra, that the wings fold underneath. The elytra open for liftoff like gull-wing doors on a car, freeing the wings for flight.

6. Although fireflies may remain in their larval state as voracious underground predators for up to two years, how long do adult fireflies live?

One year

Six months

Merely a couple of weeks

They hibernate underground in cold months for years!

Adults may live only a couple of weeks, and most do not eat during this time—they just mate, lay eggs and die. This means that the fireflies you see in your backyard this summer are the result of successful matings from 2017 and they will be the parents of fireflies that you will not see flashing until 2021.

Explanation

Adults may live only a couple of weeks, and most do not eat during this time—they just mate, lay eggs and die. This means that the fireflies you see in your backyard this summer are the result of successful matings from 2017 and they will be the parents of fireflies that you will not see flashing until 2021.

7. Why have some female Photuris fireflies been called "femme fatales," meaning deadly ladies in French?

Eating toxic males of other species, Photuris females can transfer that poison to their eggs as a chemical defense.

Femme fatales sneak onto spider webs to steal fireflies already captured by the spider as their own food.

ALL of the above!

By mimicking the flash patterns of other firefly species, the female lures unsuspecting males in closer. Preying on the males of other species allows Photuris females to acquire their toxins, called lucibufagins, which the females then deposit into their eggs as a chemical defense.Predatory femme fatales have been caught stealing wrapped fireflies from spider’s webs, a behavior called kleptoparasitism (parasitism by theft). How they identify their incapacitated prey and emerge from the web unscathed remain unanswered questions.

Explanation

By mimicking the flash patterns of other firefly species, the female lures unsuspecting males in closer. Preying on the males of other species allows Photuris females to acquire their toxins, called lucibufagins, which the females then deposit into their eggs as a chemical defense.Predatory femme fatales have been caught stealing wrapped fireflies from spider’s webs, a behavior called kleptoparasitism (parasitism by theft). How they identify their incapacitated prey and emerge from the web unscathed remain unanswered questions.

8. How do fireflies light up the night?

Very tiny AAA batteries inside their bodies

Some species of fireflies don't light up at all

Enzymes create the glow when combined with internal chemicals, like glow sticks when broken

All but the first answer

Some species of firefly have a unique way of performing their mating signals: they synchronize their flashes. Truly synchronous fireflies are found in Southeast Asia.

Explanation

Some species of firefly have a unique way of performing their mating signals: they synchronize their flashes. Truly synchronous fireflies are found in Southeast Asia.