Nature Notes are very late this year. Thanks to Jean Hughes Raber who wants to know what's with the fire flies in 2016, I have been stirred to action. She has very few of our dazzling friends. We have less than few, almost none.

This is a survey of the fire fly population on dotCommonweal. Don't hold back.

Perhaps I shouldn't expect to see the fire fly blinks mid-July. It is a lesson never to leave your nature post in June. So much happens. The laurel bush flowers have come and gone. Did the Iris bloom? Can't tell. The Alliums bloomed, and are now overwhelmed by the ferns. Elderberry bushes full of berries without my having seen the flowers. It is locally reported that June was very dry; the corn is still very low to the ground. But in our little patch everything green is so green, so abundant that I think our sliver of micro-climate had rain. That doesn't explain the fire flies unless they too have come and gone. Alas.

Previous reports:

May 30, 2011

June 22, 2012,

June 27, 2014

June 12, 2015.

Margaret O’Brien Steinfels is a former editor of Commonweal. 

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