Happy #WildlifeWednesday! With summer officially over and fall beginning, let's bid farewell to an iconic nocturnal animal of summertime, the lightning bug! Lightning bugs are soft-bodied beetles that are also commonly referred to as fireflies. There are more than 2,000 species in the firefly (Lampyridae) family, with about 12 dozen species found in Ohio. Lightning bugs get their name from their ability to flash bright lights in the darkness, like a tiny bolt of lightning. All lightning bugs glow as larvae. They use this glow to warn predators that they do not taste good. The larvae eat snails, slugs, and worms. Lightning bugs produce their light through bioluminescence, light emitted due to a chemical reaction in a living organism. Bioluminescence is nearly 100 percent efficient and little energy is wasted to produce their light. Lightning bugs use their flashes to attract mates, and the light can be yellow, green, or orange in color. Lightning bugs can be seen in Ohio from late May through August, with peak activity occurring June through mid-July. Be sure to visit the Enchanted Forest for a last glimmering peak at a Lightning Bug until next year! Written by Michelle Leighty, TWC Environmental Education Specialist
This is the third in a series of Friday posts leading up to TWC’s Shapley Lecturer presentations being given on Thursday through Saturday, October 1st-3rd. The Wilderness Center is honored to host Harlow Shapley Lecturer Dr. Quyen Hart on October 1-3, 2026. The American Astronomical Society (AAS) Harlow Shapley Visiting Lecturers Program brings distinguished astronomers and astronomy educators to schools and communities across North America to share the wonder of the universe and inspire people to bring science into their lives. The Lecturers Program has been a long-running tradition for the Society. It grew out of AAS’s Visiting Professors Program dating back to 1958 and is named in honor of distinguished astronomer and former AAS President Dr. Harlow Shapley (1885-1972). Harlow Shapley was a farm kid from Missouri and the first in his family to attend college. He had not intended to study astronomy, but after taking his first course he was hooked. He got his undergraduate degree in Astronomy from the University of Missouri and his PhD from Princeton University. He served as director of the Harvard College Observatory from 1921 to 1952. During this time his groundbreaking research transformed our understanding of the size of the Milky Way, identifying the true location of the Sun in our galaxy’s outer disk and not at the center of the galaxy as was believed at the time. Shapley participated in the “Great Debate of 1920” over the nature of “spiral nebulae” – what we now call galaxies – were they a part of the Milky Way or their own “island universes” far outside the Milky Way. This issue and debate helped shape the modern concept of the galaxy and began extragalactic astronomy. Shapley was one of three founding lecturers in the AAS Visiting Professors Program, which received intermittent funding from the National Science Foundation from 1958 to 1971. Upon Shapley’s passing, a private donation from the Perkin Fund – established by Richard Scott Perkin, a close friend of Shapley for more than three decades – enabled AAS to continue the Visiting Professors Program beyond the end of federal support. Now renamed in Shapley’s honor, the Harlow Shapley Visiting Lectures Program honors his legacy by continuing his lifelong mission to bring astronomy to broader communities. Check the Shapley Lecture details, pick the lecture date and time that best fits your interest, and join us on October 1st, 2nd, or 3rd for Dr. Hart’s lecture, Rising Above: How Space Telescopes Rewrite Astronomy. Registration is required. All Shapley Lecture activities are free – all lectures, Friday evening planetarium show, and star watch. Whether you’re a lifelong astronomy enthusiast, a student exploring a future in STEM, an educator, or simply someone who has ever looked up and wondered what’s out there, this is an opportunity you won’t want to miss. Written by Robin Gill, Astronomy Education Specialist
