Fireflies make dazzling comeback in NYC area for this surprising reason
The metro area's once-dimming firefly population has made a dazzling comeback this summer thanks to the abnormal amount of rain dumped on the region in the past few months.
'They need to have moist, wet environments. They do really well when there's a lot of rainfall,' explained Dr. Jessica Ware, an entomologist and curator at the American Museum of Natural History.
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3 Fireflies are making a comeback in the metro area this summer thanks to the abnormal amount of rainfall.
Xinhua News Agency via Getty Images
'The extra rain, that extra moisture, that is really good for the juvenile [fireflies] — the juveniles develop into adults, and those are the adults that are moving around and flashing.'
While the wet stuff may have foiled plenty of human-made plans, it made for an all-out buffet of snails and slugs for young lightning bugs to feast on before burrowing in the moist ground to transform from their wormlike state into the illuminated critters that are synonymous with summer.
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Scientists have not yet been able to quantify just how much lightning bugs are surging across the five boroughs and New Jersey, but it's clear to anyone who takes a walk at dusk that the illuminated critters are floating around in stronger numbers than in previous years.
The flood of bugs can be directly linked to the nearly double amount of rainfall that was doused on the five boroughs alone this spring, with roughly 6 inches falling in May.
More than half the month — 18 days — recorded precipitation.
3 Lightening bugs thrive in moist conditions.
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But the surge in fireflies this summer is also a trick on the eyes, Ware said.
'In general, populations are declining, so it's not necessarily that we're seeing more. It's that we're not seeing as few,' Ware said.
Fireflies are not considered to be an endangered or threatened species, but their populations have been seriously dwindling in recent years.
3 Firefly populations are overall still declining, according to experts.
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They face a series of hazards, including from insecticides and light pollution, the latter of which is a serious issue in the Big Apple.
As with migrating birds, lightning bugs become disoriented by overwhelming lights — and if it's too bright, the fireflies are unable to see one another's flashing bulbs, an issue with mating.
There also were fewer inches of rain overall in the Big Apple in the past two years, meaning fireflies were a rarer sight in the city — if anyone cared enough to notice.
'That's the Joni Mitchell song, right? 'You don't know what you've got 'til it's gone,' ' Ware said, quoting the classic 'Big Yellow Taxi.'
Fortunately, New Yorkers can expect the lightning bugs to light up the rest of their summer, especially for the remainder of July.
The fireflies are putting on their flashy and bright 'teenage dance' to find their mates this month, with most of the action lighting up the sky at dusk.
'This is a peak time for them — they're all going crazy with their hormones, but they're just trying to get as many copies of their genes for the next generation as possible,' explained Ware.
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New York Post
2 days ago
- New York Post
Get granny some AC: How using a fan when it's really hot out could actually make the elderly hotter
As New Yorkers sweat through relentless heat this summer, many are cranking up electric fans in a desperate bid for relief. But a shocking new study throws cold water on the popular cooling fix, warning it could actually backfire for older adults under certain conditions. Researchers found that in some blistering environments, sitting in front of a fan can increase body temperature in seniors — putting grandma and grandpa at greater risk of heat stroke and other serious health problems. 4 Thousands of people in the US suffer from heatstroke each year. SERHII – The study, conducted by scientists in Australia and Canada, tested how electric fans affect older adults under both dry and humid heat conditions. In the first phase, 31 adults aged 60 and older were exposed to hot, dry air — 100.4°F with just 15% humidity — simulating severe indoor heatwave conditions. Each participant completed four separate, three-hour sessions spaced at least 72 hours apart: fan only, skin wetting without a fan, skin wetting with a fan, and no intervention. Instead of cooling them down, fan use in dry heat caused participants' core body temperatures to rise by 0.5°F. They also reported feeling hotter and less comfortable. The findings suggest that, rather than cooling the body, the fan was actually pushing heat into it. Previous research from the same team found that fans used in hot, dry conditions tripled cardiac strain in older adults — a potentially deadly consequence for people with heart disease. 4 Extreme heat can exacerbate existing medical conditions and even accelerate aging. Felix Mizioznikov – 'In very hot and dry heat, fan use worsened all outcomes and should be discouraged for these conditions,' the study authors wrote. The second phase of the study focused on hot, humid conditions. This time, the researchers included 58 older adults — including 27 with a history of coronary artery disease, who had been excluded from the dry heat tests due to potential heart risks. In these tests, room temperatures again reached 100.4°F, but with 60% humidity. Unlike in dry heat, fan use in humid conditions slightly lowered participants' core temperatures by an average of 0.18°F. It also boosted sweating and made participants feel cooler and more comfortable overall. An earlier study by the same team showed that fans — with or without skin wetting — also helped reduce cardiac strain under similar humid conditions. 4 Studies suggest roughly 9 out of 10 homes in the US have some form of air conditioning. Satjawat – Together, researchers say the findings challenge CDC guidelines that advise against using fans when temperatures exceed 90°F, citing a potential increase in body temperature and related health risks. 'While air conditioning is an effective way of staying cool, it's not available to everyone, especially those most vulnerable to the heat such as the elderly and people with heart disease — so it's positive news that low-cost alternatives are effective, Dr. Daniel Gagnon, a researcher at the Montreal Heart Institute and co-author of both studies, said last year. 'Importantly, the study has shown that the weather conditions affect the type of cooling strategy that should be used — a vital piece of information that will help older people to stay safe in heatwaves,' he added. 4 Extreme heat events are becoming more frequent and intense in the US. Günter Albers – Heat waves are becoming more frequent across major US cities — and more dangerous, as sweltering overnight temperatures offer little relief from the day's heat. Each year, an estimated 60,000 Americans end up in the emergency room due to heat-related illnesses like heat exhaustion and heat stroke — and more than 13% of those cases require hospitalization, according American Medical Association. In New York City, the danger is already playing out. On June 25, a record-breaking 99°F scorcher sent 141 people to emergency rooms with heat-related issues — the highest single-day total since 2017. Extreme heat is the deadliest weather-related hazard in the US, with more than 14,000 deaths directly linked to heat since 1979. But experts warn the true toll may be far higher, as heat is often underreported or overlooked as a contributing factor. In New York alone, more than 500 people die prematurely each summer due to extreme heat — the vast majority inside their homes without air conditioning. The city operates cooling centers to help vulnerable residents, but for those relying on electric fans at home, the new research makes one thing clear: check the humidity. If it's dry, that fan could leave you even hotter than before.
Associated Press
4 days ago
- Associated Press
Fireflies are lighting up summer skies. But the glowing bugs are still on the decline
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Scientific American
21-07-2025
- Scientific American
Were the Wright Brothers First in Flight? Inside a 1925 Dispute
Rachel Feltman: Happy Monday, listeners! For Scientific American 's Science Quickly, I'm Rachel Feltman. You may have noticed we've been taking a bit of a break from our usual Monday news roundup to make room for special episodes, including our bird flu series, as well as to accommodate some summer holidays and vacation plans for our small but mighty team. We'll be back to the news roundup format next week. For today I thought it would be fun to dip back into the Scientific American archives for a few minutes. Let's check in on what SciAm was up to exactly one century ago, in July of 1925. On supporting science journalism If you're enjoying this article, consider supporting our award-winning journalism by subscribing. By purchasing a subscription you are helping to ensure the future of impactful stories about the discoveries and ideas shaping our world today. I'll start with the issue's cover story, which was contributed by the curator of marine life at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City and seems to have been written, at least in large part, to introduce readers to the concept of tide pools. These are indents in rocky coastal areas that during high tide get filled with water, which remains trapped once the tide goes back out. The writer describes the abundant marine life that could be found in the high tide puddles of Woods Hole, Massachusetts and other Massachusetts tidal zones, waxing poetic about barnacles and sea worms, which he compares to 'acrobats' and 'Goddesses of the sea,' respectively. One hundred years later, scientists and laypeople alike are still quite taken with tide pools. They're really interesting environments: during low tide they're generally shallow enough that they can get quite warm, which can be challenging for the organisms living inside them. Other difficulties for these organisms include the fact that tide pools are easy for predators such as birds and crabs to access. On top of that, oxygen levels in the pool drop off between infusions of new seawater. Plus, tidal pool residents often have to withstand crashing waves when the ocean reaches them again. A lot has changed since 1925, but checking out tide pools is still a great pastime for anyone hanging around the coast. Depending on where you live, you can spot anemones, starfish, coral and even octopi, among other things. The issue also features a somewhat scathing assessment of the U.S. commercial aviation industry as it stood in 1925. According to Scientific American 's editors, someone visiting from abroad asked them whether one could travel from New York to Chicago by airplane. (He asked this question, by the way, by calling up the magazine's office. Life was hard before Google.) The editors told him that he'd have to hire his own airplane to make such a trip, which would be very expensive. But that got them thinking: Would this request have been reasonable in the traveler's home country? Thus began SciAm 's investigation into the world of commercial flight. RIP SciAM Editors, you would've loved The Rehearsal. The resulting article points out that in the U.S. in 1925 commercial aviation was mainly used to get mail from one coast to the other. Meanwhile, the article explains, countries in Europe were already in the midst of an aviation boom, using planes to move people and products all over the place. According to the article, one could travel from London to Berlin for $40, which amounts to about $753 today. That's not exactly bargain airfare, but it's not so far off from what a modern flier might pay to travel in business class, and one can imagine that most folks paying for the privilege of air travel in 1925 were either traveling for important business, flush with cash or more likely both. It's clear that the Scientific American editors were dismayed to find the U.S. lagging so far behind. In an inset titled, rather dramatically, 'Are We a Negligent People?' the magazine asks what has become of American aviation. 'We invented the airplane, neglected it, and left to Europe the task of putting it into widely extended commercial service,' the section reads probably in a transatlantic accent. 'As a people we are supposed to have a perfect genius for practising rapid-fire methods in our industrial activities. We are supposed to have developed time-saving into an exact science and have shown the world how to practise it. In the airplane, the Wrights gave us a time-saving machine which, if our business men had not been so possessed with the desire to make money and make it quickly, would today be one of our principal means of transportation for men, mail and light freight. Save for the fine work of the Army, the Navy, the Air Postal Service and a few private firms, we have done practically nothing, leaving to Europe the developing of commercial transportation.' That's not the only aviation tea in the July 1925 issue. In the magazine's 'Our Point of View' section the editors reflect on Orville Wright's decision to send the first power-driven, person-carrying aircraft to the British National Museum. If you're not familiar with this historical scandal, here's the gist: the Wright brothers are famous for making the first powered, controlled flight in 1903. But for decades the Smithsonian Institution tried to give that honor to Samuel Langley, its former secretary, whose own flying machine had crashed just days before the Wrights' aircraft succeeded. In 1914 the Smithsonian's director had Langley's aircraft retrofitted to prove it could have flown—if only it hadn't failed—and used that to award him the credit. The museum displayed the aircraft with a placard to that effect. Orville Wright was, understandably, displeased. In Scientific American 's July 1925 issue the editors say that the museum display is misleading and that Langley definitely did not beat the Wright brothers. 'The whole matter, indeed, may be regarded as very much of a tempest in a teapot,' the editors wrote, 'and it could easily be set right if the Smithsonian Institution would remove the objectionable placard and change it so that there could be no possible misunderstanding.' That wouldn't actually happen until 1928, and the Smithsonian didn't get around to apologizing until 1942. But hey, we tried! Though the U.S. was lagging behind in commercial flight, a graphic from the 1925 issue shows we were leading the charge in at least one technological arena: gabbing on the phone. The infographic contends that 62.9 percent of the world's telephones in 1925 were located in the U.S. and that the country led the way in phones per capita as well. We also came out ahead in terms of how often people got on the horn: the average person in the United States apparently sent 182 messages via phone each year, with second place going to Denmark with 123. And Russians, the editors noted, were 'content with four and one-half calls' each. Sure we're talking a lot, but are we actually saying anything? That's all for today's archival adventure. We'll be back on Wednesday to talk about some of SciAm 's hottest summer reading recommendations. And tune in next week for a return to our good old news roundup. Science Quickly is produced by me, Rachel Feltman, along with Fonda Mwangi, Kelso Harper and Jeff DelViscio. This episode was edited by Alex Sugiura. Shayna Posses and Aaron Shattuck fact-check our show. Our theme music was composed by Dominic Smith. Subscribe to Scientific American for more up-to-date and in-depth science news.
