{"id":5604,"date":"2024-06-10T09:14:07","date_gmt":"2024-06-10T13:14:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/?p=5604"},"modified":"2025-02-14T11:41:14","modified_gmt":"2025-02-14T16:41:14","slug":"chasing-a-ghost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/magazine.ncsu.edu\/2024\/chasing-a-ghost\/","title":{"rendered":"Chasing a Ghost"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n\n\n

The last of the park\u2019s visitors are leaving as Clyde Sorenson \u201980, \u201984 MS, \u201988 PHD and his wife, Lee, pull into the parking lot at the Durant Nature Preserve in north Raleigh. A longtime friend is there to meet up with them, and they spend a few minutes catching up while waiting for it to get dark. They are here to hunt for fireflies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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As anyone who has been a kid knows, there\u2019s something magical about hunting for fireflies on a dark summer night. But Sorenson, an Alumni Association Distinguished Professor of entomology, is closer to retirement than he is to his childhood days, even if he does retain some childlike qualities that endear him to the students he teaches at NC State.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more than two decades, Sorenson has taught ENT 201, an introductory lecture course on insects. He figures he\u2019s taught more than 8,000 undergraduate students about arthropods and exoskeletons. He\u2019s been known to show up for class in Bostian Hall wearing shorts and a T-shirt covered with scientific drawings of insects. He uses cartoons to make points during lectures and tosses out plastic insects to students who answer questions (or just make him laugh). He calls them \u201cbonus bugs,\u201d and students can turn them in for points toward their grade. He even gets students to eat chocolate-covered crickets and hush puppies made with mealworms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\"Clyde
Clyde Sorenson \u201980, \u201984 MS, \u201988 PHD is all about the insects, whether it’s in the field or in the classroom, where he gives out plastic ones to students for extra credit, below left and right, and sometimes wears them on his shirt, above. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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\"Clyde<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Clyde<\/figure>\n<\/section>\n<\/section>\n\n\n\n

So it\u2019s not surprising that he\u2019s excited as it finally turns dark on a late spring evening in north Raleigh.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Sorenson is not just searching for any old firefly. There are thousands of species of fireflies in the world, and Sorenson says about three dozen species have been identified in North Carolina. But none of those are of interest to Sorenson tonight. He\u2019s hunting for what he believes is a species that has yet to be identified. He\u2019s found it in a variety of locations, including the woods behind his house in Johnston County, but he needs more evidence to make the case that he\u2019s discovered a new species.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a really dramatic demonstration of how much here is still to know,\u201d he says. \u201cThere have been folks that you could call naturalists walking around here for 400-plus years. Even though this is one of the most intensely studied patches of ground on the face of the planet\u2009\u2014\u2009eastern North America I\u2019m talking about, but in particular North Carolina\u2009\u2014\u2009there are still new things to find, new things to understand.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLittle Ghosts and Fairies\u201d<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Sorensen\u2019s fascination with wildlife began when he was a child, leading him to draw pictures of birds and collect fireflies with his brothers outside their great aunt\u2019s house. His renewed interest in fireflies came about several years ago, when he was hiking the Appalachian Trail in Virginia with his son and some of his Boy Scout buddies. Tired of the racket the boys were making around camp one night, Sorenson wandered off by himself into the woods. What he saw virtually took his breath away. \u201cThere were these little blue lights going all through the woods,\u201d he says. \u201cIt was really kind of magical. There were maybe a couple of hundred of them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When he returned to campus, Sorenson learned through some research that he had stumbled across a species known as the blue ghost firefly, or Phausis reticulata. They are found primarily in the southern Appalachians, and their meandering flight about a foot or two above the ground creates a continuous blur of blue-green lights. They are only visible for a handful of weeks in late spring or early summer\u2009\u2014\u2009their mating season\u2009\u2014\u2009and then for only about an hour or so each evening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Clyde<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

As word of the blue ghost spread, they became enough of a draw that tours for people wanting to see them are now offered each year in places like the Pisgah National Forest in western North Carolina. \u201cI like to imagine those early Scottish settlers, coming down from up north\u2009\u2014\u2009as superstitious as they were\u2009\u2014\u2009coming into this part of the state and seeing these,\u201d Sorenson says. \u201cThey must have been freaked out\u2009\u2014\u2009all kinds of little ghosts and fairies going through the woods.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sorenson\u2019s reaction was a renewed interest in fireflies and learning more about the many species of the insect. \u201cThey\u2019re extremely charismatic,\u201d he says. For much of his career at NC State, Sorenson has focused on insects that may not be charismatic, but have an economic impact\u2009\u2014\u2009agricultural pest management, particularly with tobacco. But his focus over the last 10 years has shifted to conservation biology, and he frequently contributes articles to popular, non-academic publications. \u201cMy job is to help discover things and to bring those things to broader attention,\u201d Sorenson says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy job is to help discover things and to bring those things to broader attention.\u201d
\u2014 Clyde Sorenson \u201980, \u201984 MS, \u201988 PHD<\/p><\/div><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

So when Sorenson heard about a couple in Chatham County, N.C., who had reported seeing blue ghost fireflies on their property, he was intrigued and suspicious at the same time. It seemed unlikely that blue ghosts would be found so far from the mountains.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When he and his wife went to Chatham County in 2020, they spotted a dozen or so fireflies hovering a foot or two off the ground, just like the blue ghosts. But something seemed off to him. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t as bright as the ghost I was familiar with in the mountains,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Above: Blue Ghost, (unnamed<\/em>), Female Larviform, Chatham County, N.C. Below left: Blue Ghost, (unnamed<\/em>), Male, Chatham County, N.C. Below right: Blue Ghost, (Phausis reticulata<\/em>), Male, Southern Appalachian Mountains.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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<\/span><\/span>

Clyde’s Find<\/h2><\/a>
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The unnamed firefly species that Sorenson has found is different in key ways from the blue ghost firefly found in the North Carolina mountains. The unnamed species is not as bright as the ghost species found in the mountains. That\u2019s presumably because the female blue ghosts have five to nine light spots, while the unnamed species has two light spots. The males of the unnamed species have smaller light organs than their blue ghost counterparts. There are also subtle differences in the shape and coloration of the fireflies\u2019 shield and abdomen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, the habitats for the two species appear to be different. The blue ghosts are found primarily in the mountains, while the unnamed species has been spotted in Chatham, Johnston, Montgomery and Wake counties.<\/p>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n

The following year, Sorenson used Facebook and other means to ask friends if they would take part in an informal citizen-science project by looking in their backyards for fireflies close to the ground and flashing a blue-green light. John Conners, a friend who had worked for years as the city naturalist for the city of Raleigh, responded with an email saying he had seen fireflies like that before\u2009\u2014\u2009at a former Boy Scout camp that is now Durant Nature Preserve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And so Sorenson, his wife, Conners and a few others went out looking at Durant one night, and found dozens of them. He heard from other friends in the area who had found them, prompting Sorenson and his wife to visit several spots around the Triangle to find and collect this new type of firefly. \u201cIt was like the magic of fireflies,\u201d he says. \u201cYou can get people engaged with these magical little critters.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cEasier to Care About\u201d<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Before long, Sorenson had found what he believes to be a new, still unidentified species in Chatham, Wake and Johnston counties. He wondered if they could even be in the woods behind his house. The answer, to his delight and chagrin, was yes. \u201cAfter 25 years of living in this house, I discovered something I had no idea was even there,\u201d he says. \u201cI was really, really embarrassed. But, also, it was great. It was awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Having collected several samples at this point, Sorenson was able to start documenting the differences between the blue ghost and the species that he was finding. The light organs on males of the unidentified species were smaller than those found on the blue ghost, which would explain why the lights looked dimmer to Sorenson. The female blue ghosts typically have between five and nine light spots, while the females of Sorenson\u2019s firefly always had two. There are also identifiable structural differences between the males.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAt the very least, it\u2019s a subspecies of the blue ghost, but in all likelihood it\u2019s actually a different species.\u201d
\u2014 Clyde Sorenson \u201980, \u201984 MS, \u201988 PHD<\/p><\/div><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

“At the very least, it\u2019s a subspecies of the blue ghost, but in all likelihood it\u2019s actually a different species,\u201d he says. \u201cYou\u2019ve got all these morphological differences. You\u2019ve got habitat differences. So there are some pretty dramatic differences.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Eventually, Sorenson hopes to have enough evidence to make the case\u2009\u2014\u2009probably in a scientific journal\u2009\u2014\u2009that he has identified a new species of firefly. If that happens, Sorenson may get the opportunity to give the new species a scientific name and a common name\u2009\u2014\u2009early contenders are Piedmont ghost and foxfire ghost.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere\u2019s great power in a name. If you know what something is, it\u2019s a whole lot easier to care about it.\u201d
\u2014 Clyde Sorenson \u201980, \u201984 MS, \u201988 PHD<\/p><\/div><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\u201cScience doesn\u2019t give a rat\u2019s patootie about common names,\u201d he says. \u201cIt wants the new scientific name. But from a perspective of promoting conservation and awareness, you have to have a common name. There\u2019s great power in a name. If you know what something is, it\u2019s a whole lot easier to care about it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n