Summer officially started this week with the Summer Solstice which marks the longest day of the year in the Northern Hemisphere.

Sunset was nearly 9 p.m. this week and the further north that you headed, the longer daylight hours you would experience. In the Arctic areas, you would have been experiencing the midnight sun phenomena where the daylight was nearly 24 hours long. Since we did not have the midnight sun, we did have our own form of light shows.

The light shows that I am speaking of is a natural event featuring the emergence of the summer fire fly species from the U.S. and Canada under the Latin name Photuris pensylvanica or the lightning bug as we called them as kids.

I stumbled upon the emergence of the summer firefly by coincidence just this week early Monday at 4 a.m. We had been having trouble with a black bear tossing the neighborhood trash cans around in his endless search for tasty tidbits left over from people and their Sunday meals.

That simply meant that I could not sleep soundly waiting for the crash of a tote being flipped over and garbage bags strewn about. To my amazement, instead of the bear giving me a show, I saw hundreds of the Pennsylvania firefly put on a dazzling flash pattern across my front lawn.

The show was between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m. and then it tailed off as sunrise was threatening to make its appearance.

The appearance of so many lightning bugs as we called them when we were kids reminded me of summer nights at my grandmother’s place. She had a large backyard that stretched up to a long hillside orchard.

My siblings and cousins would procure some mason jars and flit about in the darkness, catching the beetles as they showed off their twinkling lights. We would have the older kids punch a few nail holes in the lids for breathing air and even put in some grass for them to feed on, we didn’t really know much about them.

That jar would sit on our dresser and give us a cool night light until we fell asleep and somehow when we awoke the fireflies were all escaped back to the yard and the chase would begin anew the next night.

Fireflies are abundant in Pennsylvania and are enjoyed across the state for their ability to transform our night skies into a twinkling light show of thousands of bioluminescent greenish-yellow lights. The firefly is actually a small flattened beetle that is primarily black in color with red and yellow markings in the form of stripes down the center of its thorax.

The firefly is carnivorous, feeding mainly on insects, snails and worms. The females lure male fireflies with their flash patterns in order to prey on them as well. The firefly is threatened by changes in how people care for their yards with pesticides and changes in the environment including hardscaping of once natural fields and meadows.

Modern lawn care is not the friend of the firefly and a once common sight may not be so common in our future!

The firefly became the state insect of Pennsylvania back on April 10, 1974 when then Governor Milton J. Ship signed Act 59 into law, making the Pennsylvania firefly the state’s official insect.

A group of school students from Highland Park Elementary School students in Upper Darby, Pa., began the campaign that included letter writing, the circulation of petitions, and even the distribution of bumper stickers with the advice and support from state legislators. That truly was the age of innocence and a common good was accomplished!

Pennsylvania so enjoys the firefly that an Annual Firefly Festival is held in the Allegheny National Forest each summer during the peak of the firefly season. The sites for the festival events are in the Hearts Content & Loleta Pavilions in June of each year right around the Summer Solstice periods.

For information about the Pa. Firefly Festival call 814-230-2035 or on line at pafireflyfestival@gmail.com or pafireflyevents.org

Just a reminder, the Pennsylvania Hunting Licenses are now available online and in your local sport shops and stores. The license is valid from July 1, 2020 through June 30, 2021. There is no increase in the prices so take advantage of the bargain while you can!

Jay Hewitt is an outdoors columnist for the Butler Eagle