What's Your Nature?

Become a Nature Up North explorer to share your encounters with wild things and wild places in New York's North Country. Post your wildlife sightings, landscape shots, photos from your outings, and even your organization's events!

Minerva View

Great day soaking in the sun.

St. Lawrence Snow

Incredible shot of the snow coming down with Richardson Hall.

Minerva Beach View

Great day in and out of the water.

Sunny Day on the Lake

Beautiful day where everything seemed in harmony.

The Secret World of Fireflies

If you look outside on a warm North Country summer night, you’re likely to see tiny blinking lights floating through the sky, disappearing and then reappearing a few feet away. These fireflies (Lampyridae) are not made of fire nor are they flies! They’re actually a member of the beetle order, Coleoptera, the largest known order of organisms in the world with over 350,000 beetle species described and upwards of a million or more species still predicted to be undiscovered.

Poster with the title of blog, The Secret World of Fireflies, and the Nature Up North logo over a picture of fireflies glowing in a dark forest
Photnius pyralis (Common Eastern Firefly) on a white fence