Meet the Malaysian conservationist who dedicates her life to protecting fireflies • The Revelator

When I was a child, my mother taught me to stop playing outside and come home at the first firefly of dusk. For many years, I believed what most children believe: when night falls, the day is over. It wasn’t until I interned with the Arches National Park Student Conservation Association, many years ago, that I began to explore the night sky and all the secrets it holds.

Wan Faridah Akmal Jusoh had a similar experience. As the Malaysian conservation scientist recounted at a TED Women talk in Atlanta, Georgia, last fall, she and her siblings grew up in a “superstitious, conservative community” and were always told to go home at sunset. “That particular rule made the night mysterious to me,” she said at the talk, where we first met. “I spent my school years admiring the darkness, but I never really had the opportunity to explore it.”

When she was a young scientist, that began to change. One evening, while boating in a mangrove estuary, she found herself surrounded by thousands of fireflies, all blinking in unison. As she said in her TED talk, “That’s the moment I’ll never forget—the moment I officially fell in love with kelip-kelip”, the local name for fireflies.

Now a lecturer in biodiversity and conservation at Monash University in Malaysia, Jusoh has dedicated her career to firefly research and conservation. Among her accomplishments, she recently co-authored a paper describing firefly threats and conservation strategies around the world.

Another area of ​​Jusoh’s research focuses on the genus Pteroptyx, also known as congregating fireflies. Like the insects she saw that fateful night, Pteroptyx gather in large swarms in trees and shrubs along tidal rivers in mangroves and flash their lights in near-perfect synchronization. Because of these displays, the IUCN calls them “flagship species.”

But even these icons are in danger. Last month, just days before World Firefly Day on July 6, the IUCN Firefly Specialist Group announced that four species congregating together—the Countess firefly (Bear Pteroptyx), synchronous curved-wing firefly (P. malaccae), perfectly synchronous flashing firefly (P. tener), and the non-synchronous curved-wing firefly (P. valid) — have been deemed vulnerable to extinction, one step above the “endangered” category. (The extinction risk of most firefly species has not yet been assessed, a problem the specialist group is working to address.)

On the day the IUCN Red List was announced, Jusoh and I met via video to discuss his work.

There are over 2,200 known species of fireflies. They are found on every continent except Antarctica. And each type serves as an indicator of its habitat. Why is this important?

Fireflies are very important. I think the first thing we talk about is the balance of the ecosystem. There are also other insects that play a similar role, but if you look at fireflies, their life stage has a different role.

When we talk about firefly larvae, we are also talking about maintaining a good habitat for their prey. For example, we are talking about firefly larvae that feed on snails. Snails need good water quality. When the water quality is not good, the snail population decreases and the firefly population decreases as well.

But I also like to talk about specific fireflies, like the water firefly. We don’t have many of them, at least not all over the world, but there are water fireflies that can swim. They need high quality water to live in the water.

It’s not just about fireflies. When you remove one firefly from the ecosystem, you disrupt other parts of the food chain.

For those of us who are not scientists and have not dedicated our lives to fireflies, what can we do to help foster healthy habitats so that the widest variety of firefly species can thrive?

This may sound funny, but as a collective group of firefly researchers, we all say that the first very simple thing you can do is turn off the lights when you’re not using them.

This is the simplest thing we can do as citizens because fireflies communicate with each other using signals. And when the light is too strong, the number of fireflies decreases because it disrupts their communication.

Second, if we can’t contribute scientifically, we can always go to a citizen science program. There are national recording systems, or something like iNaturalist. People (like me) actually get the data. Sometimes users will ask, “Hey, what is this species?” The experts will try to identify it. And that’s very, very useful. We can see that (and say), “Oh, I’ve never seen that firefly, maybe next time I should visit that place.”

I think awareness and education are very important. And in terms of contribution, almost every country has a citizen science program today.

Maybe we think this work is slow. Maybe we don’t see the return on investment in this kind of work. But in the long run, it creates stewards, people who, one day, when they know there are fireflies here, will become the eyes and ears of scientists to help protect them.

You talked about the moment you first saw the kelip-kelip dancing, and how it was a moment of wonder and excitement. And that moment gave birth to your entire life’s work. What would you say to people who may not have experienced this wonder yet? Where would they begin to find wonder in nature?

I think it’s very difficult to answer that question. I think it really depends on how open you are to curiosity, to new experiences. If you’re a nature lover or have a great curiosity, you’re probably easily drawn to that kind of mystery. The message can be very powerful. But I think the fireflies have a power here, because even when you’re looking at them, you still have this magical moment.

In your talk, you talked about how coming home at dusk meant that the night was mysterious to you. And that’s something that’s shared by children all over the world. How would you recommend encouraging children to marvel at the dark?

People talk about safety, about kids going out at night, and that makes sense. But when you grow up – and we’ve been taught from a young age that you’re not supposed to go out – you feel unsafe. There’s always a lot of doubt before you go out and explore. But there are always ways to do it.

Today we have many opportunities to go and explore an already established area, for example an ecotourism area. If we are not sure yet, and especially if we are afraid of the night, we can go with our family, ask our friends to accompany us. The more, the merrier.

Watch Dr. Jusoh’s TED Women talk below: