Dawn Troutner Toledo Market Master

This Memorial weekend market was a slow one. There were still 13 vendors there with plenty to sell. Some of the items available were bakery, eggs, jams, jellies, herbs fresh and dried, popcorn, onions, radishes, spinach, garlic, turnips, rhubarb, lettuce, homemade angel food cakes(Darold is now selling whole, halves or quarters of the angel food cakes), and plants. During this market we had a much needed rain shower.

It is very dry at my house. I drug out the garden hoses (notice I said hoses), the water bill is going to be high. Hot and dry, summer is here. Saturday night I saw my sure sign of summer evenings. The Lightning Bugs were out. They are an amazing bug, flying around flashing all night long. Some call them Fireflies. Seeing them brings back memories as a child, making diamond rings and bracelets out of them. In my garden I see those bugs throughout the day. But nightfall comes and they are flying around flashing. By flashing Lightning Bugs are trying to attract their mates. It is the males that fly around flashing. The females stay perched on vegetation, usually near the ground. If the female sees a male flasher and she is ready to mate she will flash right after the male’s last flash. So that a flasher doesn’t attract a firefly of a different species, each Lightning Bug species has its own special flash pattern. Lightning Bugs are a member of the beetle family.

Have you wondered what a lightning bus eats? The Lightning Bug larvae live on the ground usually under bark and in moist places. They eat earthworms, snails, and slugs. The Lightning Bug larva injects a kind of a chemical that paralyzes their prey and helps digest it. The adult Lightning Bus can live for several months and feed on plant nectar. Nectar is nothing more than sugar water produced naturally by all kinds of flowers. So to make sure you have enough nectar for Lightning Bugs, Hummingbirds, bees, or any other bugs you want to feed make sure you have some flowering plants in your garden or yard. See you at market.

Homemade Nectar Recipe

Boil 4 cups water, add 1 cup sugar, and stir until dissolved. Let cool. Pour into feeders. Store any unused nectar in the refrigerator. No need to add food coloring. Do not use honey. Honey will quickly ferment becoming poisonous to the birds.