Fireflies in Xishuangbanna have entered the best viewing period. Why does this animal seldom appear in cities?

Fireflies seem to exist only in fairy tales, but they seem to be rare in real life. As a northerner, I have never seen them since I was a child. There are many such creatures in Xishuangbanna, Yunnan, really many. April to August is the best viewing period of fireflies every year. Here you can see thousands of fireflies shuttling through leaves, grasslands and lakes. There are stars everywhere, just like a lamp flying all over the sky, just like in a dream world.

You can see so many fireflies in Xishuangbanna, Yunnan, but why are they rare in cities? It is estimated that 95% of urban people have never seen fireflies. There are no fireflies in the city because the living environment of fireflies is very bad, and the ecological environment is too cold, too hot, too wet and too dry. Tens of thousands of fireflies were introduced into Zhongshan Park in Qingdao, but after only three days, half of them died one after another.

There are more than 2000 species of fireflies in the world, including nearly 300 species in China. The rapid development of cities has led to changes in the environment, and the number of fireflies in various places has also dropped sharply, and some have even become extinct. Fu Xinhua, an associate professor at Huazhong College of Agricultural Plant Science and Technology, went to Emei Mountain in 2006 and found a firefly luminous belt stretching 100 meters, but when he went again two years later, all the fireflies disappeared.

For us in the city, fireflies are hard to see, but on the Internet, fireflies have become a magic weapon for businesses to make money. Especially, Tanabata every year has become a disaster day for fireflies. Some shopkeepers claim that the turnover of fireflies on Qixi is several hundred thousand.

The disappearance of fireflies is also related to agricultural farming. The larvae of fireflies go through a long dry season. If farmers use crop rotation, rice will become dry fields after harvesting in July, and then fireflies will die because of lack of water. In addition, pesticides are the only reason to kill fireflies. Fu Xinhua has been paying attention to the ecological environment of this firefly for many years. He not only established a firefly research center, but also established a firefly reserve, which effectively protected fireflies and allowed tourists to watch more ecological fireflies.