Biolumin-what?

Don’t ask me why (Because I really can’t tell you. Well I guess I could. But it’s not something I should probably… yeah. No. Not telling.), but I spent a good deal of time today reading about Lightning Bugs (aka Fireflies). Which are neither bugs nor flies (discuss).

I was ever-so-disappointed to learn that we know definitively – as I suspected – that they mostly flash their little lights to attract mates. Also as a distress signal. Are there no mysteries left in this world!?!

I also learned there are over 170 species out there. Geeze! Perhaps the most interesting is the cannibalistic “Femme Fatale” who fakes the distress signal until another firefly comes to the rescue and then she eats him! Yikes!

Another fascinating fact: the chemical cocktail produced within lightning bugs to create their bioluminescence has been replicated in a lab and is the formula used for most of those glow-sticky things you get at carnivals and whatnot. Is that common knowledge? Am I the last to know that? I think that’s really cool!

Ahh. I can’t wait for summer.