← Robin's Nest from American Humane
Robin's Nest from American Humane
Sergio Henriques, Invertebrate Conservation Coordinator at the Global Center for Species Survival
00:26:16
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- [00:02]
Dr. Robin Gansert
Welcome to Robin's Nest. So many of us have a deep connection with the animals around us and want to protect them from the pets in our homes to endangered species in the wild. That's why I joined American Humane. As one of the oldest and most effective animal protection groups, we help billions of animals around the world. Join us as we explore how we can build a more humane world together. Hello and welcome to Robin's Nest. I'm Dr. Robin Gansert, and this is the official podcast of American Humane and Global Humane, the nation's first and most experienced humane organization focused on the protection of animals all over the world, including certifying zoos and aquariums, being the first boots on the ground in crises, and rescues making sure animals are safe in the filming of movies on sets, globally protecting 1 billion animals and farms, and our military veteran and military dog programs. There's so much to talk about with American Humane's power to touch lives and keep animals safe and loved. And today, we're focusing on something most of us across generations have a cherished memory of. Fireflies are also known as lightning bugs. Oh. Remember chasing them on dark summer nights and looking in amazement at the glowing light as one landed on your arm? Well, now friends are concerned that many of these populations are dimming. And there's great concern for this precious creature across the world. Today, we are talking to a firefly expert, Sergio Henriquez, invertebrate conservation coordinator at the Global center for Species Survival. He's the chair of the International Union for Conservation of Nature's spider and scorpion specialist group. And he uses more than 20 years of experience mobilizing resources to promote conservation. He regularly engages with a global network to tackle threats such as illegal wildlife trade, using the latest technological tools to reverse the ongoing decline of the most diverse group of organisms on Earth, invertebrates. We are so glad that you, our listeners, are taking the time to hear some remarkable stories, and we want to hear what you think after. After you've listened, please make sure to review Robin's Nest on your podcast platform. Well, here we are in Robin's Nest with fond memories of fireflies. When I grew up, all I saw in summers were fireflies everywhere. What a beautiful, beautiful memory. And today, I'm so excited to introduce to you a firefly expert and truly the conservation coordinator at the Global center for Species Survival, Sergio Enriquez. Sergio, I am one of your biggest fans because I've always loved fireflies. It takes me back to a moment when I was a little girl visiting my grandparents in Ashland, Kentucky, and Hanging out on the backyard and looking at the garden and we saw and enjoyed fireflies. Welcome to Robin's Nest. I'm so glad to have you here today.
- [03:19]
Sergio Henriquez
Yeah, thank you for having me, Robin. Really nice to be here.
- [03:21]
Dr. Robin Gansert
Well, you are, I think, the consummate expert on fireflies. And we'd love to know more because when I look out now and take my kids in the backyard, we don't see fireflies anymore. Or at least not to the numbers we had when I grew up. I won't tell you my age, but it was some time ago. Tell me what's going on with fireflies and tell me truly, if we can back up for a minute, tell me about your important work at the Global center for Species Survival.
- [03:53]
Sergio Henriquez
Sure. So, so that I'll try and answer the first question. So your, your observation, what you've experienced is sadly not unique. Many people of my generation, our generation have reported that and they were children and it was summer and they were. They walked barefooted on their lawns or their backyards. They would witness the, the magical viewing of the night settling that kind of warm nights in summer. And just the forest, the trees around your house just being lit, lit up. Or the trees will become ablaze, as some would say. Or the beauty of the display of the fireflies, because their numbers can be truly. Actually, it's part of their behavior. They can flash synchronously or they can flash out of sync, but their numbers are so great that they confuse predators. So their numbers are so hard that you can barely pick where one is and the other is. So it's just a daunting and magical experience for children and adults alike. And as you were sadly saying from your own empirical experience in everyday life, you now wanted to share that with your children, as many people do. And you sadly struggle. And there's many reasons why that's the case. It is known. Experts have known. I'm just one of many experts in a network of experts here in the US and around the world who noticed that decline. The insect decline is a well known or well documented phenomenon, sadly. And fireflies are insects and they have been declining as well. There are several reasons why they decline, but it remains to be, remains to be a sad fact that when you go out these days, you do see less and fewer than you would just a few years ago.
- [05:25]
Dr. Robin Gansert
So this is fascinating to me and I know you're part of the iucn. Can you share with our incredible listeners of Robinson what is IUCN and what is the work that you're doing at The Global center for Species Survival. Because I think all of this fire, the reduction number of fireflies and insects in general, that's part of that sixth mass extinction and iucn and your work at the Global center for Species Survival is crucial in fighting this war on extinction.
- [05:58]
Sergio Henriquez
Yeah, that's exactly. That's part of our mission here. So the first one, I'll answer the IUCN question. IUCN is an acronym. It stands for the International Union for the Conservation of Nature. And it is exactly that. It's a union of experts from around the world that are combining their knowledge, their expertise in fighting extinction or biodiversity decline. One of the most famous products of the IUCN that people might have heard from your listeners is the Red List assessments, or the Red List, which is basically measures the extinction risk of animals, plants and fungi around the world. And it's like a metric or the list and it's. Sadly, we noticed that a lot of the fireflies, as well as many insects have been declining, so their extinction risk really has increased. The Global center here, the Global center for Species Survival is based at Indianapolis Zoo. It's a partnership, as you said, with the iucn, and we support the ssc, which is the Species Survival Commission, which is the commission responsible for the Red List, among other things. And it's basically, it informs a Red List where all these experts are divided in specialist groups. There is the firefly specialist group, which is led brilliantly by Sarah and others. And there's of course the spider and scorpion specialist group, which I personally chair. And there's other specialist groups that share other invertebrates and of course, mammals, birds, amphibians, all sorts. And the network works with the Global center to just, let's say, expand, accelerate that, that effort, just because extension is accelerating as well. And if we don't put effort into it, it will not stop on its own. So we are driven to support and just enhance action, conservation action in the field.
- [07:37]
Dr. Robin Gansert
You know, we talk about the six mass extinction. And for people who don't, aren't in the space of conservation, aren't familiar with IUCN or the center for Species Survival or our good friend Dr. John Paul Rodriguez talks about this a lot too, in his role. You know, the sixth mass extinction sounds so foreign, it sounds so distant, like, oh, it sounds like a dinosaur extinction. Can you share with everyone in Robin's Nest what does the sixth mass extinction mean and why is it urgent?
- [08:11]
Sergio Henriquez
Yeah, so the six mass extinction is just a number of extinction phenomena throughout the eons, throughout Earth's life, really. And what we call the six because five happened in the Past out of, you know, natural geological causes, the meteor being the most famous, are the KT Extinction. Dinosaurs to extinction. That's the most famous one. And we call it the sixth one because all the five ones recorded in history, this would be the six that we have measured and detected. And what it really means when people say we're in the midst of a sixth mass extinction is that there is something called the background extinction rate, which is basically species, you know, naturally out of evolution or phenomenon is just going extinct. If an island erupts in a volcano, some of the animals and plants might go extinct. That's part of a natural extinction rate. What's happening now? It's not that we are many, many times over accelerating that natural rate. And that's happening for a lot of reasons. People need resources and food, and we tend sometimes to take more than we need or to take it unsustainably. And that has led habitat loss, pollution, and, of course, species to go extinct. And that rate is so high that the extinction that's going on now, the extinction rate is comparable to extinctions in the past, like the one that exterminated dinosaurs.
- [09:28]
Dr. Robin Gansert
Wow. Now, I've read startling numbers like 1 million plant and animal species in our children's lifetime. Is that what you're finding at the Global center for Species Survival?
- [09:40]
Sergio Henriquez
Yeah, that's true. So in my own research as an academic, I did look at that 1 million number, you said, and if you look at the IUCN Red List, so the Red List of species, species can fall into these categories. Right. And there can be threatened and can be not threatened, basically. And the estimate now is that over a million species of plants and animals, as you said, and some fungi are on the extinction pathway. What that means in practice is that from the academic side, we know they're declining. But from a practical side, for your listeners and people like myself who care deeply about these species and want to see them thriving, is that if we don't stop this decline, if they continue going down this route, it's a matter of time until they're gone. And sometimes this is like an opportunity window. Either you intervene now when it's feasible and it's possible, or it might simply be too late. And all the animals and species you might care or love for or you might not even know they existed, they were just there. They might be gone by the time you look for them. They're now extinct. So we want to prevent that. That's the work we do here, and that's the work we do with our partners trying to Accelerate that process, accelerate.
- [10:42]
Dr. Robin Gansert
The saving of species. And that's really, really crucial. And we talk about the timetable, it's within, you know, a generation. We're not talking about a thousand years now. This is really a very crunch time to have action. And we could talk about extinction forever. But we're going to talk a little bit more about one of our favorite childhood memories of fireflies. And I know this is one of your passionate areas of interest, but first of all, I want to thank you for what you do. I thank you for your academic work. You're in field work. It's very, very important to have experts like you on the frontline saving species. Tell me a little bit about fireflies. And number one, you love them, clearly. And you can't protect what you don't love. You can't love what you don't know. Right. And you certainly know the incredible firefly. Introduce folks in Robin's Nest to the firefly.
- [11:39]
Sergio Henriquez
Yeah. So it's a great topic. They're amazing animals. People associate them with magic. They're not magical, but they do really feel like that. And so fireflies aren't flies at all. They don't produce fire as well, but they do produce light. And they're not lightning bugs, they're not real bugs, and they don't produce lightning. So they're actually beetles. Fireflies are a group of beetles that have evolved this ability to just produce bioluminescent, so light in darkness. And so when you're a child, or if you're an adult and you're looking in this dark skies, and if you're like in your backyard or in a forest, if you're lucky enough, you see this quiet, very humble blink.
- [12:16]
Dr. Robin Gansert
Yes.
- [12:17]
Sergio Henriquez
And then blink. And that phenomenon, really, when you see it like that in flight, it's usually the male trying to tell the female that he's fit, he's available, and he's looking for a partner. And often, if he's lucky, if he does the right song in the right way at the right temple. Rhythm is essential for fireflies. Maybe a female firefly will see that and in response will have her own flashing song, and they will sing together in a duet. That's their love song. They sing with light. And that's really unique in the terrestrial realm around us. So that's one of the few things we see that produces their own light. One of the few species, and they do it a lot in the US There's a number of species here in Indiana, where we're based in Indianapolis. The list is now at 43 species present in the state. But there's like 2,000 species of fireflies around the world and they're spread along continents. In my home country of Portugal, I used to see firefly as a kid as well. And they're beautiful as well. And they have their own display. Here in the US you are lucky enough to have the synchronous firefly. So there's a number of species and the way they flash, how they do it, the color of their flash, there's orange flash, blue flash, green flash. That coloration, that rhythm is indicative of what species it might be. So it can tell someone with some knowledge and expertise. And if you're curious enough to tell, that flashing pattern in that top of that tree can only be that species. And so you can actually admire them and appreciate their presence and understand a little more about their biology just from looking at them.
- [13:49]
Dr. Robin Gansert
I love that and I love that we're talking about a little matchmaking process happened with these beetles. And the light and the song. It's beautiful. I didn't know we'd be covering romantic topics in Robin's Nest today, but it's magical. I do love it. And I know you said it's not magic, but it feels like it, doesn't it?
- [14:07]
Sergio Henriquez
It does feel, yeah, absolutely. Well, but there's a good reason why it feels like magic, is that, like I said, these are not. This is not a common phenomenon across the animal kingdom. If you look at the terrestrial realm, like if you go around your yard, you don't see other animals blowing or producing life. It's quite a unique thing. So when we look at the mythology around fairies and, or leprechauns and elves or imps, a lot of fireflies have those names as common names for a reason, because people link those two phenomenon to that. There's beauty and there's magical and that which you cannot easily perceive or is not common for you to see. And fireflies have very short windows of emergency, meaning that they only come out in summer. You've noticed that most species, flashing species come out in summer. And even then you will have species that are only out for two weeks. And within those two weeks, if it's rainy, windy, if the weather isn't right or too cold, only like 50% of the time or 60% of the nights is when they will be out and displaying. The other nights, they might just not have that chance that they'll miss that window. So males really need to shine and females really need to pick their partners so that the species can follow. And when we, out of safety or out of other concerns, produce a lot of light pollution, that really doesn't help that message. Right. The way I sometimes tell it to people is that if you're trying to talk to a partner or a friend at a concert or a heavy metal concert, but you're whispering, your message is not going to get through. And that's what we're doing with light. We're beaming a lot of light into the natural world. It's going everywhere. And animals are trying to sing with a whisper. It's a very soft, very humble song, the firefly song. And it's very easy to be drowned. And we have ever more light pollution in our cities, even outside of our cities. So they struggle. That's one of the reasons why they struggle.
- [15:53]
Dr. Robin Gansert
I was going to ask you about their struggling. First of all, are they considered vulnerable or endangered for instinction, where are they on this famous IUCN Red List?
- [16:05]
Sergio Henriquez
That's, that's a great question. So it really depends. The first, most honest answer to your question. We don't know all the species. We haven't looked at all the species of fireflies in the world and put them on that list because it's a time consuming effort and just funding hasn't been yet invested. We do have some experts lacking expertise in some regions, but overall we just haven't really put. But in North America where that effort has valiantly delayed and has been done here, we do know, for example, here in Indiana, one of the most threatened fireflies is threatened, it's vulnerable. And that's what people call the cypress swamp firefly, which northern range is Indiana. And even though that's not common name now, the cypress swamp, its original name was probably Wawa Samwa, that's the indigenous name for the species. And it was called that I believe by the Miyamyaki people because when we say Wawa samwa, that's how it flashes Wa, some wa. So flash, flash, flash. And so the name of the indigenous people reflects its behavior, its unique behavior. And that's a threatened species of firefly and it's only found in two places in Indiana, for example. So not doing well. And as you might know, people might know your listeners, freshwater isn't doing great. We drained a lot of wetlands, agriculture and other means and we haven't managed water that well or preserve wetlands. So when these species like fireflies will depend on wetlands, they, they feed on snails when they're larvae. So fireflies are predators and they feed on snails, which as most people know they like humidity. And when we remove that component of the ecosystem, you also drive their numbers down. If you kill snails because they feed on your plants, you're also driving their numbers out.
- [17:48]
Dr. Robin Gansert
Wow. So we're really, I understand there's like so complicated in terms of damaging an ecosystem, but that's what we're really talking about. So in the case of these fireflies, we're taking their ecosystem and making it uninhabitable for them. They either can't see or hear because of the noise pollution, light pollution, they can't hear the magical songs and mate. And importantly, there's may not be a food source left or we may be poisoning their area where their food source has always been provided. And the populations are now so threatened. It is very, very sad.
- [18:24]
Sergio Henriquez
It is. So you just highlighted exactly some of the three main threats. So light pollution, chemical pollution affects their food stream. So chemicals will go pesticides, herbicides, insecticides, who kill insects will go into the watershed where they thrive while they live. So it kills them that way. And then of course, just habitat loss, just simply removal of natural habitat. So as you put all this pressure on them, they of course, they have nowhere to go to be. People sometimes think fireflies are fragile and they are in some ways, but they've been here for a long time. They've endured other threats before. We're just putting too much pressure too quickly all at once. And so we're really not giving them and other species any chance to thrive. We enjoy them, but we're not giving them a choice to live or a place to live.
- [19:10]
Dr. Robin Gansert
So what you said is so powerful. And, you know, it just takes a minute to sit back and say we're not giving these species even a chance. And now in this sixth mass extinction, which people don't fully understand or can comprehend, 1 million species, plant and animals being gone within our children's lifetime, it's right upon us. We're witnessing extinctions every single day. Sometimes they're invisible extinctions, like in the situation of a giraffe and then a subspecies like a Rothschild's giraffe or whatever. But then you have something that is like so small, like the firefly. And we never really think about fireflies going extinct in our own backyard. We think about extinctions in the continent of Africa with the megafauna, the big elephants, the giraffes, the rhinos that we hear, that we know are suffering so much. But we don't think about our own backyard in Indiana, where we have vulnerable and threatened species at risk of extinction. And all because of what us humans are doing. We're not letting them have any nature at all left.
- [20:19]
Sergio Henriquez
I don't. That's absolutely correct. That's a good summary. But I wouldn't feel that listeners or anyone considering this should feel despair. There's an opportunity here as well. As you said, they're right in your backyard. So as you feel animals are declining, as you see their lights fade, don't go gently into the dark night. Fight, fight against the dying of the light. If you see them diminish, do something. In vertebrates, they do pose that challenge. They're too small. They're too small for us to see, but too important for us to lose. But they also have an opportunity that they're one of the few species that you can literally, in your own personal efforts, support their populations up because they can thrive in your backyard. You can support an entire healthy population in a good sized backyard, or you can provide, you can become a bridge for them to go from one forest patch to the next wetland where they need to go to mate and just live. And as you think about climate resilience, as climate change takes an impact on species, animals will have to move north in the Northern hemisphere or perish. So that connectivity allowing them to pass through your bark yard is crucial. So if you have a small backyard or a community garden or any action you can do with your local land, trust, anything you can do protecting that habitat can really make a difference to this species because they can live in very small patches of land comparatively to large megafauna. You were talking so you can save the species in your own backyard. If you're really motivated to have native species, reduce light pollution, reduce the use of chemicals or pesticides, herbicides, insecticides, all of that, so you can make a difference in your own backyard, you should leave this podcast and any message that you listen for conservation optimistic that you should be driven to change. You can change the fate of an entire species. And if that doesn't empower people, nothing will.
- [22:06]
Dr. Robin Gansert
I love what you just said. You gave everyone hope. One of my favorite words, you gave everyone a call to action for our own backyard, whether that's even a patio in an apartment complex, you can put a butterfly bush there, you know, on your own, on your own patio, if you have a backyard, you know what you just said, and let's remind us the pesticides reduction, all those things. Can you be very specific? If we have our own backyard, what should we avoid to save fireflies?
- [22:36]
Sergio Henriquez
That's a good question. Yeah. So I can Be specific about fireflies because it is a topic that's quite easy to convey and you can see the results by fireflies in your own backyard. You can see their lights coming back. Fireflies need darkness. So as, let's say, the day sets and twilight comes, there are species of fireflies who actually live by day and they don't flash the diurnal. And then there's a twilight species who like that kind of no low light. And that's when they come out. The Big Dipper being the most common species in the US that's the one when they come out and then as darkness settles, if you provide them with darkness, they will come and find shelter. One of the ways is to have spice bush, butterfly bush, small shrubberies or areas that have darkness and small corners of darkness with some open areas in between that will give them a space for males to sing and have that corner if you can provide them. I know not everyone can, but having just a few native plants. So go for species that are native to your local area. I'm sure you can find the resources online these days on what species are unique to where you live. Have them in your balcony, support your neighbors to do it. A little backyard to have it. Insects will thrive. Just the fact that you have those leaves growing will attract other insects, which will in turn be, let's say, snails or worms. And then fireflies will feed on them. So providing that habitat is one way. If you have a bigger yard and you have like a water feature, that's great. A nature pond, great for amphibian, probably great for dragonflies. It will be great for fireflies as well. So trying to bring back nature, this rewild effort of bringing nature to you and understanding that we are just as much part of nature as it is part of us. We breathe from it, we eat from it. So we need it as much as it needs us. We just have to learn how to work together. So if you can rewild your balcony, rewild any part of the area around you, work with land trusts, try to increase to magnify that effort if you can. It will have an impact. Invertebrates will come back if we give them a chance.
- [24:35]
Dr. Robin Gansert
I love that. Giving these invertebrates a chance and rewilding. Rewilding. What a powerful, powerful term that puts conservation literally in our own backyard. That's wonderful. Sergia. I'm so grateful for your time today. We have learned so much in Robin's Nest about conservation and having our own voice in it. But most of all, thank you for being the voice for these precious creatures that bring us back to those childhood moments of such bliss and joy. Thank you for being the voice for Fireflies and thank you for all you do on the front lines fighting for species survival. We're very grateful for heroes like you.
- [25:14]
Sergio Henriquez
Thanks so much for having me. As you know, it's always a team effort. We are a community. I would not succeed without the help of your listeners, people like yourself and others. So just, yeah, as you listen to this, go out, enjoy these animals. Appreciate it's a privilege that we live in a time when they are still here. So enjoy them and do what you can to augment them. Everyone can be their own conservation hero of the place where they live. You don't have to go far, you don't have to do a lot. Every little counts. We are desperate, in need of just seeing good news. So please do go out and do what you can. I'm sure the animals around us will be appreciated and so will future generations, because we are the stewards of this land now. So it's upon us to be good ancestors for the future.
- [25:54]
Dr. Robin Gansert
Thank you. And on that note, we will say our farewell from Robin's Nest. Sergio, thank you so much. Keep up the good fight.
- [26:00]
Sergio Henriquez
Thank you.
- [26:00]
Dr. Robin Gansert
And our listeners in Robin's Nest will be right alongside you. Thank you. Sa.