Yesterday evening we drove to the mountains, Elkmont specifically, to see fireflies! We have some fireflies in our backyard. . . but it's nothing like what we saw last night!Before dark, we walked on the trails and explored. The tree growing between the boulders in the creek was cool.
Eleven years ago a long-time occupant of one of the Elkmont summer cottages in the Great Smoky Mountains wrote to a scientist that she thought she had something special in her backyard. Little did she know just how “special” the thing was.
Georgia Southern University professor Dr. Jonathon Copeland identified the phenomenon as synchronized fireflies, one of the first confirmed occurrences in North America. Copeland knew because he had been going to tropical rivers in Southeast Asia** to study fireflies that flash in unison for years.
Fireflies (also called lightning bugs) are really beetles. They take from one to two years to mature from larvae, but will live as adults for only about 21 days. Their light patterns are part of the adulthood mating display. Each species of firefly has a characteristic flash pattern that helps its male and female individuals recognize each other. Most species produce a greenish-yellow light; one species has a bluish light. The males fly and flash and the usually stationary females respond with a flash.