Azure blue damselfly eating a mosquito
While at Strumpshaw Fen I came across this azure blue damselfly, chomping down on a mosquito.
First Azure damselfly
On couple of days ago, on a warm morning (before the horrible bitter cold wind returned), one patch of nettles near a large pond was teeming with invertebrates. Among them was my first Azure damselfly of the year. I also saw a number of red damselflies there and throughout the day, with 12+ seen around…
Orange tip butterfly and large red damselfly
I had a nice half hour or so of macro photography this afternoon, despite the blowing gale and sporadic sun! In a relatively sheltered spot I spotted a male orange tip patrolling, feeding and sun bathing around the garlic mustard. A bit further along I spotted 4 large red damselflies as I walked along the…
First large red damselfly and solitary bees
I had a bit of a rotten start to today when my key broke in the lock to one of my survey areas. Then I couldn’t find anything the rest of the morning and the cuckoo continued to evade me all day. But the day to a turn for the better when my first Odonata…
Crockford Bridge: Southern damselfly and golden ringed dragonfly
On Sunday I visited Crockford Bridge, a stream well known for its dragon and damselflies. My target species was the southern damselfly, one of the rarest species in the UK and one I had never seen. It didn’t take me long to find one! Here is a pic of my first ever southern damselfly! They…
Scarce emerald damselfly Lestes dryas
The rubbish weather so far this summer has stopped me getting much in the way of macro shots at all, let alone of the local speciality, the scarce emerald damselfly. However the improved weather last week did let me get the following.
British dragonfly and damselfly emergence and flight times
A few years ago on my old blog I posted a diagram to show the emergence and flight times of all the British odonata (dragonflies and damselflies) and a seemed to be quite popular. Since then a number of new species have become established in Britain, or are at least well on their way to…
Scarce emerald damselfly nymph Lestes dryas
Last week a realised that the emerald damselflies would soon be emerging and there would not be nymphs around for much longer. This because despite hatching in March/April, they only take a matter of weeks to grow and emerge as adults, so the time available to photograph them is not very long. I managed to…
4 spotted and broad bodied chaser dragonflies and azure damselflies
Today at Wat Tyler there were dragonflies abound at the one pond I managed to visit in my lunch break. The first I noticed was this male broad bodied chaser On the water surface a number of azure damselflies in tandem were egg laying in the weed that was at the surface. Soon after I…
Variable damselfly and Nuctenea cornuta spider eating blue tailed damselfly
On Sunday I popped to Stodmarsh NNR in Kent to see if I could see any hobbys or variable damselflies. I didn’t see any hobbies but I did see this pair of egg laying variable damselflies in tandem: I also spotted a Nuctenea cornuta spider capturing blue tailed damselfly pair As I watched it first…