Elusive Clubtail no longer eludes us

Buoyed by our success at Humbug a couple weeks ago, we returned last weekend two days in a row. It was breezy and cool, and just about everything eluded us. Russet-tippped Clubtails were still present, but we saw them in lower numbers. Nearly the whole brownfield is covered with goldenrods and eupatorium, and the bee and wasp numbers were truly impressive. When I told Mark about this, he and his wife accepted our invitation to try again for odes and hymenopterans; although Mark is the #1 ode guy in the state, his original expertise is wasps. I'd say there were more bees and spiders and the wasp diversity was diminished from last weekend. He'll have to report on the stuff he and his wife found, I'll stick to the ode storyline.

We were once again on the hunt for hanging clubtails. We saw only one Russet-tipped Clubtail, but were hopeful to voucher Arrow Clubtail (Stylurus spinceps). And both of us had seen some smaller, dark Stylurus in these recent trips, and the candidate foremost in our minds was, S. notatus, Elusive Clubtail. Typically a treetop dweller, they are...elusive. The only county records were two larval specimens taken in 1984 from the Detroit River at Grosse Ile. The distance between the Humbug brownfield and Grosse Ile can be measured in yards.

After an hour or so of wandering, I got a radio call from Stylurus that he had nabbed a male Stylurus. When I looked at it, I was pretty sure it was not S. spinceps, it did not seem large enough. And the teal-blue eyes sure looked familiar to me. We had netted a female notatus in Wisconsin some years ago. I trotted it over to Mark, who confirmed the genus and thought it was probably spiniceps. We had nets and camera gear up the ying-yang, but no gomphid genitalia cheat sheets, so we continued our exploration until we were once again caught by rain.

Back home, a quick look at the hamules and length of abdominal segment 9 confirmed my initial hunch: this was Stylurus notatus. In the photo below, check out the long hamule on the reference specimen of S. spiniceps on the top, compared to the small, pointy hamule on the S. notatus below it.

Spiniceps also has a very long segment 9, around 1.25 times longer than s8, while these two segments are about the same length in notatus. Below, notatus is on top.

This is the first adult specimen for Wayne County, and only the ninth adult specimen for the state. Elusive Clubtail is a species of special concern for Michigan, so we consider it a great success that we have confirmed it for the Refuge. Finding these insects will help guide management and restoration, and it's also good to know that after 22 years, the Detroit River is still supporting S. notatus.

Plus, it was a blast to be out with another couple that shares our love of insects, field work, and natural history. We vowed to make further trips together next field season!

New county record plus rare ode

The UDH just haven't gotten out enough this year. Despite drizzle and 90% humidity, we headed to the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge, Humbug Marsh Unit, introduced here. Late last summer, we had boatloads of Black Saddlebags (Tramea lacerata) there, and thought we saw a couple of Stylurus, one of which we felt was Russet-tipped Clubtail (S. plagiatus), a species of special concern in Michigan which I'd only found before at certain spots along the Huron River. In these spots, plagiatus and its cousin the Arrow Clubtail (S. spiniceps) would sit in shrubbery that bordered a large grassy field with scattered tall weeds or small shrubs, adjacent to the river. The old brownfield at the Refuge -- below, formerly a paint plant and one day to be the welcome center -- has precisely this habitat. We figured perhaps the warm but cloudy weather would be to our advantage and the odes would be perched. We also hoped we might have a chance to find Striped Saddlebags (T. calverti) since one had been seen along the Lake Erie shoreline in Ohio recently.

Once we got to the point along the southern edge of the brownfield where it was adjacent to the river, we started seeing Russet-tipped Clubtails. Stylurus, appropriately, found them first. We found at least two dozen prior to the rain starting again. Many were obligingly perched where they could be photographed:

We obtained two for voucher specimens, including a female with a deformed wing (below); I have a state endangered species permit which allows me to collect these species. I also collected a Tule Bluet (Enallagma carunculatum) with a deformed abdomen. Anybody who has spent enough time looking at odonata will find some funky ones. I've been thinking lately they are worthwhile to submit to museum collections, in case one day they can be examined for genetic defects or environmental contaminants, although I suppose most deformities are caused by some mishap during emergence. In this case, the Detroit River isn't particularly pristine, and there is a chemical plants just on the northern border...which was emitting strong paint fume odors even on this Sunday afternoon.

We also kicked up one or two other species of clubtails. One perched just out of net reach, and we were able to see it was indeed an Arrow Clubtail. Among the many Black Saddlebags and Common Green Darners were a handful of Aeshna darners; the ones we got looks at appeared to be Lance-tipped (A. constricta).

I was poking around some shrubs and saw a red-colored saddlebags land on a twig. Carolina Saddlebags (T. carolina) are typically not common in southeast Michigan, although some years are good for them. We've seen very few this year.

This one, however, turned out to be a Red Saddlebags (T. onusta), a new county record. There are only two specimens for the state, and one photo record from the county. Pennsylvania just had its first state Red Saddlebags, so they may be on the move this year.

Note in the poor photos that the subgenital plates of this female specimen (b) are as long as segment 9 (a). Also, the red coloration does not fill the anal loop of the hindwing, as it does in the Carolina Saddlebags. I've outlined part of the anal loop (like a drunk) in green in these photos. Red on top, Carolina on bottom.

In addition to Red Saddlebags and Striped Saddlebags, other interesting vagrants lately have been Band-winged Dragonlet (Erythrodiplax umbrata) on 11 August in Cincinnati, Ohio and Evening Skimmer (Tholymis citrina) in ~19 Aug in McCurtain Co., Oklahoma. We'll be out again next weekend!

New county record: Stripe-winged Baskettail

At the beginning of this field season, the first thing on our "to-do" list was to examine as many Common Baskettails, Epitheca cynosura, as we could find to see if some aren't actually Stripe-winged Baskettails, Epitheca costalis.

It wasn't a great year for Epithecas here, but I provided Nick (Thomas W.) Donnelly with several specimens. Nick is one of the premier odonatologists in the U.S., and a founding member of the Dragonfly Societies of the Americas. He works a lot on teasing out relationships between geographic races, subspecies, and populations of odonata that may in fact be new species or intergrades. He has a particular interest in Enallagma cyathigerum/vernale (Northern/"Vernal" Bluets), Sympetrum rubicundulum/internum/janae, (Ruby/Cherry-faced/Jane's Meadowhawks) Amphiagrion saucium/abbreviatum (Eastern/Western Red Damsels), and, Epithecas of various types.

The verdict is in: I had two cynosura males, one intermediate male, and a costalis female. Below, I provide a few photos I too, through the microscope of the terminal appendages of the female.

Reference diagrams from Needham, Westfall, and May (2000) of the undersides of female Epithecas (Tetragoneuria).


E. cynosura (Common Baskettail)



Below, a female Epitheca from Wayne Co., MI, 29 May 2006. Specimen in acetone several hours before photos taken. Female was quite fresh, and had tinted wing tips. Nick Donnellly confirms this is E. costalis.

A little "up north" field work

Last weekend, the Urban Dragon Hunters left the urban jungle for up north. In Michigan, "up north" is usually anything north of a line extending through the middle of the Lower Peninsula. We went to the northeast part of the state, hosted by Fancy Footwork Fred, new to odonata hunting. He has a great eye, but his technique needs a little refining. It involves a lot of scrambling, fast feints, and urgent whooshing swings versus a little patient stalking. Hey, we were all there once. I think we'll call him Pachydiplax, in honor of the Blue Dasher.

Probably our best find was Mocha Emerald (Somatochlora linearis), a new county record and one of a handful in the state. Another example of how little we know about the distribution of this species (last encounter is here). The only other emerald I've caught in Michigan is Brush-tipped (S. walshii), and we found a couple of those, too. New for us was Williamson's Emerald (S. williamsoni), which we unexpectedly found at a creek crossing on a pretty busy road.

We had four species of mosaic darner, which are always fun. They all look the same on the wing, and there is always a sense of anticipation once you net one and examine the combination of facial colors and the shape of the thoracic stripes and cerci to see what you've got. Lance-tipped Darner (Aeshna constricta) was the most common, as it is around here. Here is a green-from female we netted and released.

Canada Darner (A. canadensis) was also common.
We had one Black-tipped Darner (A. tuberculifera, what a cool name). Our other new ode was a Lake Darner (A. eremita), a county record. Here she is:

We were very surprised at how few damselfies we found -- species and individuals. As usual, Eastern Forktails (Ischnura verticalis) were most common. I found this dainty female having a lacewing for breakfast. Even the most delicate odonata are feared predators!

We ended up seeing 35 species and alas, the weekend was all too short. Summer is slipping away.

!Fragile Forktail!

Fragile Forktails (Ischnura posita) are not really worthy of an exclamation point, except that this punctuation mark appears on the thorax. Usually the markings are pale green, but females and immature males are blue, like this one I saw a couple weeks ago:

Stylurus and I went to a new wetland area adjacent to one of the local rivers. Considering the very hot weather we had a couple weeks ago, we sort of expected some Aeshnas to be out and about, but we saw none. Our most notable find was a single female American Rubyspot (Hetaerina americana) along the river. This is a particularly flashy, silty, pretty polluted river, and we've never seen a rubyspot along any of its branches or tributaries. The next day I read that a 500,000 square-foot shopping center will be built nearby. There goes the neighborhood.