Black firefly
The black firefly is a firefly that is busy in the daytime instead of at night. It is black with a red and yellow shield over its head. Funny thing: the grown-ups do not glow, but their babies do.
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Fun facts
The males fly low through the forest around midday, looking for females sitting on low plants.
A male finds a female by smelling her with his big, saw-edged feelers.
Its eyes are smaller than those of fireflies that fly at night.
Its eggs hatch after about two or three weeks.
Its larvae cannot fly. They live in moist places, especially in rotting wood.
Most asked questions about Black firefly
?Does the black firefly glow?
The grown-ups do not, but the larvae do glow.
?When is the black firefly active?
In the daytime, mostly from late morning to early afternoon in early summer.
?What does the black firefly eat?
Its larvae hunt snails and slugs.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Lucidota atra
- Group
- Beetles
- Family
- Lampyridae
- Classification
- Insecta > Coleoptera > Lampyridae
- Lives on
- North America
- Also known as
- Woodland lucy
Where the facts come from
- Lucidota atra (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by xpda. CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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