damselflies
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Damsels in Distress?
It’s been a terrible year for damselflies in my patch. Since March, I’ve spent 99% of my outdoor time in Green-Wood, where daily damselfly counts can be measured on one hand, a lot less than in previous summers. Rambur’s Forktail male above. Orange Bluet male. Fragile Forktail male and female. Familiar Bluet male and female.…
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Mite-y Cargo
A blue-form female Familiar Bluet, I think. About three blocks from the nearest water body. The edge of this parking lot was weedy– more recently every bit of greenery was removed. But it’s already sprouting back… Anyway, the damselfly turned out to be laden with cargo. These red things are water mites, hitching a ride.…
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Breaking
This is the first Ebony Jewelwing I’ve ever seen here in Brooklyn. They can be common elsewhere, but this is now the first record in iNaturalist and Odonata Central for Kings Co. A male. Eating a small fly in this shot. He was patrolling a puddle in the Dell Water, which is mostly drained now…
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Damselflies
Saw my first “ode” of the year on May 7th. Both damselflies, of which this is one, and dragonflies are members of the Odonata order. This one looks recently emergent. It was flying weakly, characteristic of a newly emerged adult, getting used to operating those four wings. This one is easier to identify: a Fragile…
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Late Odonata
Dragonfly eating damselfly. Eastern Pondhawk female gobbling up one of the bluets. Familiar Bluet ungobbled. Common Green Darner male. Autumn Meadowhawk female. Autumn Meadowhawk male (probably). As their name suggests, these Sympetrum genus meadowhawks are one of the last species to fly during the Odonata year.
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Citrine Observation
Six years after spotting a male Citrine Forktail at Brooklyn Bridge Park, I spotted one in Green-Wood this week. This is my second record. Ischnura hastata is one the smallest of the damselflies. They like “densely vegetated pond and lake edges, grass seepages, and quiet streams,” according to Ed Lam. The site at Brooklyn Bridge…
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Paulson on the Odonata
Dennis Paulson’s new Dragonflies and Damselflies: A Natural History‘s is a great introduction to odonating. Paulson has written the standard field guides to American/Canadian odes as well as dozens of journal papers on odonates. The pictures in his field guides are too small; that’s these guide’ principal fault. But consider: there are 461 species to…
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More Exuviae
An emergent damselfly next to the husk of its former, aquatic life stage. When they first emerge as their adult, flying form, they don’t have much color. Their wings unfurl and harden off, like their new exoskeleton. They can’t fly immediately.When they can fly, they will sometimes take shelter in trees, bushes, etc., to finish…
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Exuviae
Wait… what? This Rambur’s Forktail damselfly is perched on the exuviae of a dragonfly.Another view of the male Rambur’s green-blue color pattern. Dragon- and damselfly eggs are laid on or near water. The larval stage is aquatic. After a season, or a year (or more depending on species and location), the aquatic nymph crawls out…
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Three Common Brooklyn Damselflies
In my experience, these are the three most common Brooklyn damselflies. Eastern Forktail male. Beware that Rambur’s Forktail and Furtive Forktail males also have variations on this green thorax/blue end segments coloring. Fragile Forktail male. The broken green lines on the thorax, upside down exclamation points in this case, are unique. Not sure where this…
Backyard and Beyond 