Mayflies in May

On our way home from Sunday dinner at my parents’ house this afternoon, we were inundated with a cloud of insects. We remembered them from last spring so we promptly looked them up when we got home to see what we could learn. Here is where it gets interesting. Turns out they are mayflies. Not any big surprise, but it was this sentence from the Wikipedia article that really caught our attention:

“The mayfly belongs to group 1 taxa, or pollution–sensitive animals. This means if mayflies are in or around the water, the water should be of a good quality.”

Right behind our house is the Conewango Creek. It was reassuring to find that our seeing such a proliferation of these insects indicates that the creek isn’t polluted too badly. We work hard to not introduce pollutants or pesticides into our property so this was great news! It also goes along with our ranking of 11th in Progressive Farmer’s top 100 rural counties to live in (in the Northeast region).

If you are a resident of the Warren, PA area take a deep breath and enjoy that crisp rural environment!

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