In this episode, Matthew speaks with Sara Lewis about her book, "Silent Sparks" and her career studying fireflies. They discuss the sexually selected behaviors that are so central to fireflies' lives. After the break, they talk about Sara's conservation work focused on documenting firefly population dynamics and threat levels that different species face.
This week's Two-Minute Takeaway comes from Cheyenne McKinley, a PhD student studying bioluminescent ostracods in Todd Oakley's lab at UCSB.
Resources relevant to this week's show:
Silent Sparks, Sara's book about her career and research studying fireflies.
Fallon, C. E., Walker, A. C., Lewis, S., Cicero, J., Faust, L., Heckscher, C. M., ... & Jepsen, S. (2021). Evaluating firefly extinction risk: Initial red list assessments for North America. PloS one, 16(11), e0259379.
State of the Fireflies of the United States and Canada: Distributions, Threats, and Conservation Recommendations. Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation.
Credits: The Animal Behavior Podcast is created by a team of animal behavior researchers and audio professionals. Come meet us here! We receive production support from the Cornell Broadcast studio directed by Bert Odom-Reed, and financial support from the Animal Behavior Society.