Welcome side effects

[gerisullivan]

All that neglect of my lawn and all the rain we've been getting may well get the credit for the magical experience of walking outside a few minutes ago. Fireflies! Not just a blink here and another blink over there, flash, flash, blink, blink, blink, blink, flash, blink, blink...times 20 or more. A veritable light show. Fireflies in front of me, to my left, to my right, way up high and right down low.

Fireflies reportedly like moist soil, and they don't care for suburban lawns.

The Boston Museum of Science has been running a nationwide Firefly Watch since 2008. I first read about it a couple of years ago. Tonight, I'm more tempted than ever to sign up, but the last thing I need is another ongoing commitment to flake on. Maybe after I manage to write more than one letter of comment in a year, and paint the stairwell that elaine_brennan and I stripped the wallpaper off of when I moved in 9 years ago. Yeah, then.

In the meantime, their virtual habitat shows various blink patterns and colors of Massachusetts fireflies. It's not as relaxing as the real thing, but it's pretty neat nonetheless.

Comments

[vgqn.livejournal.com]

Maybe you what you really need is a meadow instead of a lawn?!

Seriously, is there a "Lose the Lawn" movement out east? In the west, the concept of a lawn is so inappropriate to our climate that many variations on 'Lose the Lawn" are gaining great traction. Is there any justification, other than convention, for you to maintain a vast, green lawn? No kids, no dogs, no peasants to impress. Why not become a wildlife habitat instead?

Because, fireflies!!!

[gerisullivan.livejournal.com]

I think the key to successfully turning the annoying-to-mow hillside into a meadow will be to make it look deliberate instead of simply neglected. If I leave all of the lawn unmowed, the house ends up looking abandoned. Even though I'm in a rural area, I've had other local residents expressing surprise upon learning someone actually lives here.

Meadow all the way up to the house looks abandoned. If I mow the flat parts somewhat more regularly, and perhaps put some more deliberate plantings into the meadow area to complement the pretty stuff already popping up, I might be able to pull it off. It would probably also help if I paid more attention to the area at the top of the driveway, focusing there to cut back weed trees and put in more shrubs and ornamentals.

[batwrangler.livejournal.com]

Ooh, cool. I have the same reservation about not keeping up with the survey. I also considered surveying frog songs (but they wanted people to drive specific routes on specific days and there wasn't a route near me...) And I used to report amphibian and reptile siting but I haven't really made a point of looking for them since I got Fezzik and I don't really see that many unless I go looking especially for them.

[maruad.livejournal.com]

So you like those blinking fireflies. I don't blame you.

We have started planning the redoing of our front lawn and drive way. A good portion (maybe as much as a 3rd) will be turned into shrubbery.

[cakmpls.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a magical experience!

[thinkum]

Reminds me of childhood, when I used to sit at my bedroom window and watch the fireflies light up the back yard. Mesmerizing!