Honeysuckle & Fireflies

Warm summer nights offer a wealth of delights, especially to small children, who enjoy sucking the sweet nectar out of honeysuckle blossoms and trying to trap elusive fireflies in jars. Perhaps this plant and insect are thought of together because of the nostalgic association of these two summer activities, or perhaps fireflies, who have a varied diet, feed on honeysuckle.

Honeysuckle is a wide-ranging genus that includes many different species. Trumpet honeysuckle (Lonicera sempervirens), also known as coral honeysuckle, is hardy in U.S. Department of Agriculture plant hardiness zones 6 through 8. Evergreen at the warmer end of its USDA zone range, this honeysuckle loses its leaves and goes dormant in colder areas. Yellow honeysuckle (Lonicera flava), often also referred to simply as honeysuckle, is hardy in USDA zones 5 through 8, native to the Midwest, and always deciduous. Honeysuckle can climb on a trellis, arch or fence in the garden.

Fireflies get their flashy reputations from the chemical reactions in their tails, which are used for mating purposes. Firefly females lay eggs on the ground, which hatch 3 to 4 weeks later. The firefly then spends a period of weeks or months feeding over the winter, during which it also pupates and rests for one to two and a half weeks. Adults emerge in springtime and begin the cycle anew. Because fireflies sometimes feed on nectar, though their diets also include pollen as well as slugs and worms, it is possible that honeysuckle provides a food source for them.

Though fireflies might be attracted to the sweet smell of honeysuckle, since they do feed on nectar, it is also possible that the associations between fireflies and honeysuckle are more romantic in nature. Because warm summer nights bring out both lightning bugs and the sweet, pervasive scent of honeysuckle, the two may have become linked in this way as well. One of the more well-known English language haiku poets, Peggy Lyles, remarked upon childhood memories of the two in a haiku published in the book "To Hear the Rain: Selected Haiku of Peggy Lyles."

honeysuckle

we open jelly jars

for fireflies

Whether they are truly linked or simply associated poetically, however, fireflies and honeysuckle will likely remain intertwined, at least in the minds of those who live in Midwestern and Southern states where warm, summer nights promote the presence of both. Fireflies are adapted to tropical and temperate areas, and many types of honeysuckle grow well in these areas. Both can overwinter during winter's chill -- honeysuckle in its dormant state and firefly larva in the ground -- and in summer, return the fragrant blooms and flickering lights to the evening garden.