Long time, no see

I realize this is a crappy photo, but it was beyond the range of the macro lens I had on my camera at the time. It's a Four-spotted Skimmer (or chaser, as you folks across the pond say), Libellula quadrimaculata. There are only three specimens from the county, all before 1917. Now there are four.

We found it, and one or more conspecifics, in a retention pond behind a Wal-Mart in Canton, a place we'd not been before. It was nearly entirely grown in with cattails, and mostly full of Twelve-spotted Skimmers (L. pulchella), along with a few pondhawks (Erythemis simplicicollis) and dashers (Pachydiplax longipennis) and lots of teneral Sympetrum. This was actually a birding stop for us, so I was without my net. When I saw this dull, hairy ode amongst the twelve-spots, I called for Stylurus to come around my side of the pond. By that time, the four-spot was landing repeatedly on this dead stalk. I wasn't expecting much new, nor did I realize four-spots were so furry and dull. It was a really nice unexpected surprise!

There was a little two-track heading back to the small woodlot near the pond. Since we were doing breeding bird atlas work, we thought we'd poke around. Not a hundred yards in, we found a small wooded wetland, easy to get to and quite open compared to similar ones we've found in the county. Even though it's been dry, there was plenty of water, and although our feet got wet, we didn't sink into deep stinking muck to get to the water's edge.

Stylurus immediately had a female Swamp Darner (Epiaeschna heros) ovipositing on a rotten log. I won't even display the horrible shots I got of that. My next thought was that the site looked like a great place for Great Blue Skimmer (Libellula vibrans), very similar to the site where we vouchered the first state record two years ago. I hadn't had time to voice that thought when I got a call on the radio from Stylurus, who'd wandered ahead and found a male GBS. I'll also pass on the crappy photos I took of that one, sitting over the water on a twig. This is our third location for the species in the county. Stylurus also thought he may have seen a female -- so far, we've only seen males.

It's always fun to find a new spot, although predictably this property was for sale. But it had no trails through the open understory, not many invasive plant species (and lots of less-common species for here, such as sassafras and tuliptree), and only minimal dumping or teenage presence. And to find a new species for us for the county, plus two other "good" odes made it a satisfying day.

New yard ode

Stylurus here!

It's always nice to be surprised by a dragonfly.

While tinkering on the patio, I heard some pitter-patter on top of our open garage door. The door is hinged at the top and when open it is horizontal to the ground. I did a couple of vertical jumps to see what was making the noise and a female House Sparrow flew off to the adjacent conifer. Just as I made my second jump, a friend came around the corner of the house and asked, "What are you doing?" I'm sure I looked silly jumping in place by the garage. "I'm looking at the House Sparrow," and then I thought nothing more of the bird.

Thirty minutes later I went to close the garage door since Nannothemis and I were going to head out for some urban dragon hunting. However, at the top of the door was a clubtail. I quickly snatched her up while noticing her deformed wingtips. This bug must have been the sparrow's interest.

Our "expedition" was put on hold as this wasn't a typical yard ode. After analysis with a hand lens and microscope, we determined the specimen to be a female Unicorn Clubtail (Arigomphus villosipes). There are only a dozen or so specimens for Michigan.

Although identification of villosipes is fairly straightfoward, this female had a subgenital plate and ovipositer that actually looked more like the diagrams of A. pallidus (Gray-green Clubtail, not found in our area) in Needham, Westfall, and May than villosipes, although in all other respects it was typical villosipes. Nannothemis took some pix through the microscope, and may get around to posting them here.

Stream Cruiser: One for the books

One ode I did not note in my previous post about Kentucky was a brown-and-yellow, medium-sized dragonfly we saw in several places while at Berheim Forest. They were patrolling the margins of two lakes, one a large (32 acre) lake, the other lake about a third that size. They were in constant motion, never perching, and hard to get on with binoculars. We could see the cerci were pale. This had us stumped. Unicorn Clubtail (Arigomphus villosipes) patrols like this and has pale cerci, but it was early for them, and they also frequently perch on flat surfaces.

Sylurus thought these could be Stream Cruisers (Didymops transversa). That's what they looked like, but according to our references, the habitat and behavior were not quite right:

• Dragonflies through Binoculars -- Male cruises along streams; feeds by flying low over fields, perches obliquely on weed stems.
• Dragonflies of Indiana -- Wooded streams, ponds, and small lakes.
• Dragonflies of the North Woods -- Flies low while hunting, dodging between tight spaces between plants.

We returned the next day and asked permission to try to net one and identify it. They were out again, and Stylurus positioned himself in the flight path of one of the insects. Time passed. And some more time. Eventually, I walked away to photograph some other bugs. Shortly thereafter, Stylurus came happily up the path with the subject dangling from this fingers.

It was a Stream Cruiser after all. I can't remember which book I read this in, but one description noted the "long spidery legs" of this species. This photo sure shows that!

We placed the cruiser on a shrub near the lake, where it obligingly hung around for a few more photos.

When we reported our findings to Ellis Laudermilk, the invertebrate biologist for Kentucky, he said he could not recall Stream Cruisers cruising lakes. This was a lifer for both of us.

Early Kentucky dragonflies

With all the weird weather, Stylurus and I have ended up getting our first real ode hunting in by going south, back to Kentucky, where Stylurus had to attend a meeting. We had time for a a few hours at Berheim Forest, a huge arboretum and forest reserve south of Louisville.

Fragile Forktail, Ishnura posita -- 5
Common Green Darner, Anax junius -- 1
Springtime Darner, Basiaeschna janata -- 2. Yippee! Good looks, only wish I could have found one perched.
Lancet Clubtail, Gomphus exilis -- 10, all teneral females (below). It made us wonder if the males had emerged earlier, perhaps during a warm spell prior to the early April freeze.


Common Baskettail, Epitheca cynosura -- 20. At least, we presume that's what these all were, but hard to say without netting them. See any of my tedious previous posts on baskettails.

Blue Corporal, Libellula deplanata -- 11. Lifer!

Common Whitetail, Libellula lydia -- 1.

That was it, pretty paltry showing, but we are glad to have had the chance to get out and do some searching and photographing. Hopefully, we will be able to do so again tomorrow on our way home.

A new season

We're you worried the Urban Dragon Hunters had eyeballed their last Enallagma? No, we're still here, having endured another Michigan winter and looking forward to the 2007 field season. I saw my first adult ode today, presumably a Common Green Darner, although I was going 30 MPH in one direction and it was speeding in another. I think this is one of the earliest records in the state.

As it is supposed to snow tomorrow, I hope the darner reversed course. And it probably means things will be quiet here again for awhile. But we will return!