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Welcome Lightning Bugs! Fireflies! (Beetles who light up their bums) to Wolf Trap National Park, July 18th

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Photo: “firefly 2010 06 09 092, Photinus pyralis” by Terry Priest is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0

Event Details

Use this link to register: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/n…

Wolf Trap National Park for the Performing Arts,
1551 Trap Rd, Vienna, VA, 22182Event will begin at 7:30 pm Meet behind Filene Center.

Cover your flashlights and phone with red film. Red film with be available.

Nature will provide the fireflies and music, the symphony of the nocturnal creatures.

A talk about fireflies will be given by Alonso Abugattas, The Capital Naturalist, about all of their mystery and magic.

Link to talk: http://capitalnaturalist.blogspot.com/2014/06/fireflies.html

Information about how to use artificial light at night responsibly will be provided. Artificial light at night prevents the fireflies from finding dates, to find mates to make little baby fireflies. Learn what you can do to protect them and save them from extinction.

Bring a chair, blanket, a dessert and a drink. Wear comfortable shoes suitable for walking on uneven ground. Come prepared to savor the night as Mother Nature designed it, in this treasure of Wolf Trap National Park. And most of all come to have fun dancing with the fireflies!

Event will proceed rain or shine.

More about fireflies: https://www.firefly.org/

 

Firefly Walk, June 9th

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Image: Courtesy of The Clifton Institute

Friday, June 9, 2023
8:00 – 9:30 pm
Cost: $10 ($5 for Friends of the Clifton Institute)

Registration is REQUIRED.

The Clifton Institue
6712 Blantyre Road
Warrenton, Virginia 20187

Who doesn’t love fireflies? Many of us have fond memories of catching fireflies or watching a magical light show on a summer evening. But why do fireflies flash? What do they eat? How many species are there? And are fireflies disappearing? Learn all about these fascinating insects with Ariel Firebaugh, firefly researcher and Director of Scientific Engagement at UVA’s Blandy Experimental Farm (Boyce, VA). After a short talk, participants will walk around grounds, practice identification, and enjoy the light show!

Fireflies: Hosting Nature’s Light Show into Your Garden, program Feb.3rd

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American Legion
400 N. Oak Street, Falls Church VA
Monday, 3 February 2020
7:30 pm
Free

Lightning bugs (aka fireflies) are part of the magic of growing up in the eastern United States, yet most people know very little about them. Nature education specialists Kris and Erik Mollenhauer have studied fireflies, seen “blue ghosts” and “synchronizing fireflies,” and explored some of the dark secrets of the Night Country. This program explores the “fairies of the night” and how we can create habitat in our gardens to keep them flashing for years to come.

BIO: Erik and Kris Mollenhauer are retired educators but committed volunteers. Erik taught high school science for 15 years, then worked as an educational program developer for 24 years. He developed a program with Costa Rica based on songbird migration as well as an international teacher exchange program that led groups to several countries, including Russia, Australia and Japan. For 5 years he helped National Geographic improve geography education in NJ schools; for 30 years, he’s used a portable planetarium to teach the night sky to people of all ages in the US, Canada, Russia and Japan.

Kris was an elementary school teacher for 14 years, then spent 12 years as a Reading Recovery teacher, teaching struggling students how to read. Working with the Monarch Teacher Network, the Mollenhauers have taught monarch butterfly workshops across the US and Canada for the past 20 years and guided groups to the winter monarch colonies in Mexico and California. They’ve also developed many educational projects together, including the East Coast Vulture Festival, the Mad Hatter’s Tree Party, the Gloucester County Bird Quest and, most recently, the Gloucester County Firefly Festival.