anna_walker's Identifications

Colorado Fireflies

I think this is a first for us, and I did not know that fireflies even existed in Colorado. One evening we looked down on the sidewalk outside the front door of our cabin outside of Florissant Colorado, 8872 altitude, and noticed something glowing. It turns out that this is the female, of the fire fly “Microphotus pecosensis” sometimes called the Mountain glow worm. It does not have wings, but does glow as observed in our picture. The biology of the western glow worms is poorly understood. There are several species. The female is wingless with a large light organ on the tip of the abdomen. The male is winded but non-luminous although young males may show some light from larval light organs.