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Lightning bugs
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this post was submitted on 06 May 2024
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Their decline has been so sad. I moved somewhere with fireflies in 2007. The first year they were everywhere. The second year less so and they were completely gone by 2010. I always tried to leave longer grassy areas for them but they were just... gone. It was so so so sad. I didn't grow up with them and that first summer was enchanted and magical.
I have great memories of walking down the road on a hot night with thousands of slowly blinking balls of light. The person who lives in that place now probably doesn't even know that fireflies are supposed to be in the area.
Lightning bugs have a multi-year lifecycle that includes living in fallen leaf matter, hunting for other bugs, before emerging in like 2-3 years. So they need places that don't haul away all of the fallen leaves/plant matter or use broad spectrum pesticides.
I've always kept all the leaves in rows along our fences for the lightning bugs to live in, which is also popular with the song birds hunting for bugs. That and don't do the broad pesticide treatments.
It seems insane to me that Americans use pesticides on their own garden and lawn. Do you not walk on there? have your kids and pets play outside? What are you even trying to kill with the poison?
Ain't just Americans
For us it's fire ants. They'll destroy your yard if you let them.
If you're having a problem with fire ants it's likely due to overuse of broad spectrum pesticides. Fire ants have tons of natural predators, but they are usually taken out by broad spectrum pesticides a lot more effectively than the ants.
So you end up killing most of the earworms, spiders, dragonflies, and beetles, while only killing off some of the fire ants. This generally just gives the ants more room to expand
I would switch from broad spectrum pesticides and just purchase some nematodes you can spray as needed.
I have only ever used fire ant specific pesticides. They're just a problem in my area.
Let me preface this by saying, I agree with your overall message about avoiding broad spectrum pesticides in the lawn, but I'm curious where you got this information from your first paragraph?
I ask because these things seem completely at odds with my experience and with most of the information I've read about fire ants.
I really don't know anybody that uses broad spectrum pesticides in large areas of their lawns or gardens, but fire ants take over yards anyway. I certainly don't use them here and none of my neighbors do.
While fire ants may have tons of natural predators in their native territories, the issue in most of the areas where they are invasive is that there aren't any/many natural predators that are actually capable of keeping the populations under control. They breed and migrate so aggressively that critters who predate them don't make a dent. And the native ants don't have much defense against fire ants.
Additionally, I'm not sure there are any current nematode products available in the US that are known to be effective against fire ants. Doesn't mean that won't change or that there aren't new products I'm not aware of, though. Just saying, that general consensus is that it's not a viable solution.
Thank you!
How do you make your lawn a color of green that doesn't exist in nature? Checkmate, Eurotrash.
it's called "plants other than grass" and works really well, most swedish lawns remain green for most of the year and require jackshit care other than mowing every now and then.
How are these "plants other than grass" supposed to make TruGreen rich and cause algae blooms in the local waterways? You guys are so behind.
Although plenty of people do it, most aren't treating their whole yard or entire garden in pesticides on a regular basis. Most people who are using pesticides are just spot treating here and there, maybe spraying their home's foundation to keep out ants and termites and things of that nature.
People who use pesticides in their lawns will have different reasons and different approaches, but some common reasons (real and imagined, I'm not defending the practice) are typically to control pests like fire ants, Japanese beetles, yellow jacket wasps, termites, fleas and other parasites, and many other things that are region specific.
And honestly, some people just don't like bugs. I think that's ridiculous, but it's way more common than you might think. Any tiny creature in their house warrants the nuclear option. A wasp nest on the underside of a deck terrifies them.
I don't mind most insects but wasps can go fuck themselves. They are one of very few living things I will go out of my way to kill when I see them. Ticks and bedbugs are the other two.
Why do you have such a problem with pesticide manufacturer profits? No wonder you don’t understand American culture!
( /s - I have a family and tons of animals and a very ragged lived-in yard)
Yeah, mulching your leaves instead of bagging them is really what makes a difference for fireflies. And since suburbanization and HOAs often require (or at least heavily encourage) bagging leaves, it means the fireflies have nowhere to mature.
Stopped mowing our farm, lightning bugs are back in swarms. It's great.
I haven't seen a firefly since I was a small child. I've never really thought about them before, but it is kind of sad not seeing them. Generally I hate bugs, but fireflies are pretty.
We used to catch them in jars as kids growing up in rural south. Tired to see who could get the most, then release them and watch them all make a show.