Saving a blue-eyed darner dragonfly.

When I was growing up I used to spend a lot of time down at the local creek and pond. I always marveled at the aerobatic displays put on by dragonflies. I watched with interest as their maneuvers allowed them to capture other flying insects. I could throw a pebble near an airborne dragonfly and it would chase it until it hit the ground or water. Ever since I have had a passion for these flying juggernauts.

While paddling on a mountainous lake I noticed there was quite a population of dragonflies. They were all blue-eyed darners, a large insect commonly found through much of North America. The one in the photograph is a male; it has two diagonal stripes on its thorax and blue blotches along the length of its abdomen (tail). I found one that had become trapped on the surface. Its vibrating wings sent ripples over quite a distance and I'm sure in time a fish would have answered the metaphoric dinner bell. However, I pulled it out and left it to dry and warm itself on my kayak. The beezy, sunny day facilitated this and soon it was airborne again.

It was a little later than I had the opportunity to extract a second one from its watery tomb. It had a damaged wing to add to the maelstrom and tickled the water's surface as the previous one had. I decided it was time to get out my camera, a compact Panasonic FZ2500, and photograph the recuperating creature. I shot it at f/10 (the minimum aperture for the camera is f/11) with a shutter speed of 1/60th of a second. The built-in vibration mitigation ensured sharp edges even with the low shutter speed.

The dragonfly cooperated nicely and allowed me to get several shots of it. I was in awe how its lower face could open up to dispatch prey. The mechanism is quite different from the labial mask its juvenile uses. While on my finger the tail poked me a few times. Males have claspers at the end of the abdomen to allow them to grasp the female while mating. They were surprisingly sharp, which makes sense given the fact that the females can receive significant wounds during the mating process.

It stayed with me for the rest of the journey and I placed it on a post where it could finish drying itself off. I do not know what became of it after that. The truth is dragonflies all eventually die off from either predation, frost, or injury. An adult can live 6 months if conditions are good. I would think the dragonflies there may have had a couple of weeks at best given how rapidly fall was advancing. I did enjoy the opportunity to study one close up though.

Thanks for reading.     Ericspix     Eric Svendsen