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2005 Records |
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Submit your Dragonfly Records Online
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Latest records at the top. Scroll to earlier records at the bottom of the page.
4 September 2005 Montgomeryshire Canal, Sunnymeade to Rhysnant Bridge Up to 20 Migrant Hawkers. Mostly males in vegetation at the side of the canal and patrolling. There were many rival males fighting. Up to 5 Brown Hawkers 1 male Common Darter 1 male Ruddy Darter Migrant Hawkers are the dominant species on the canal at the moment.
30 August 2005 Montgomeryshire Canal, Sunnymeade to Rhysnant Bridge Up to 10 Brown Hawkers, 1 female ovipositing Up to 10 Migrant Hawkers, most at the edge of the towpath in emergent vegetation 1 poss. male Emperor Dragonfly 1 male Azure Damselfly
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August 2005 Small pool on N. edge of Lake Vyrnwy SJ022217 Common
Hawker. 1 male patrolling.
21 August 2005 Montgomeryshire Canal, Sunnymeade to Rhysnant Bridge Up to 10 Brown Hawkers 4 male Azure Damselfly 1 prob. male Ruddy Darter 1 female Southern Hawker patrolling the towpath and resting high in Hawthorn trees.
20 August 2005 Montgomeryshire Canal, Sunnymeade to Rhysnant Bridge 1 mature male Ruddy Darter in hedge with an overall olive green coloration Up to 10 Brown Hawkers on the wing or resting on the hedges 1 Migrant Hawker on patrol No Azure Damselfly seen
15 August 2005 Montgomeryshire Canal, Sunnymeade to Maerdy Bridge Up to 20 Brown Hawkers in flight today in a 1km stretch and in the hedge resting at 6pm. One very battered old male was seen with numerous holes in his wings. 1 unidentified darter Up to 5 Azure Damselfly
12 August 2005 Montgomeryshire Canal, Sunnymeade to Rhysnant Bridge Up to 10 Brown Hawkers in a 1km stretch 2 male and 2 female Azure Damselfly 1 male Ruddy Darter
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August 2005 Garden at Collot House, 20 Severn Street, Welshpool
SJ22580734 Common
Darter male, resting and patrolling beside garden pond. 7 August 2005 Montgomeryshire Canal, Sunnymeade to Rhysnant Bridge The first Migrant Hawkers are starting to appear on the canal this week. Brown Hawkers are still common too. The damselflies are now in decline with less than 5 Azure Damselfly seen.
8th & 9th July Breidden Pond, New Pieces Forestry, Breidden. 1 male Emperor Dragonfly patrolling over pond 1 male Blue Tailed Damselfly Female Brown Hawkers 3 female Banded Demoiselle 1 male Azure Damselfly 1 male Large Red Damselfly (a late record for this species which is usually absent on the canal by now) 1 pair of Blue Tailed Damselflies mating
26 June 2005 - Montgomeryshire Canal, Four Crosses. The first brown Hawkers are appearing now. Females are often found basking in the sun on hedgerows adjacent to the towpath and can be approached very closely if you are quiet and slow. Also present today were male Emperor Dragonfly, male Large Red Damselfly, male Blue Tailed Damselfly and male Banded Demoiselle.
18 June 2005 - Montgomeryshire Canal, Claftons Bridge to Maerdy, Four Crosses. The wet, windy and often cold weather carried on into early June and has provided few opportunities for observation lately. The first solitary male Emperor Dragonfly on the Montgomeryshire Canal was seen on 7th June near Maerdy, Four Crosses. Today (18th) in the 25+ degree heat there are roughly 10 per kilometre with males patrolling along the surface of the canal while females try to oviposit on surface plants.
Four-Spotted Chasers have been seen on the canal over the last two weeks and are fairly infrequent visitors. All of those seen so far have been females which tend to hunt from a perch overhanging the water that they frequently return to. Patrolling Emperor Dragonflies often disturb the Chasers and will fight them off. I managed to get some good clear photos of the chasers today (not easy as they usually perch out of range of even a long lens) and they are posted below.
Female Four-Spotted Chaser (click to enlarge)
Azure Damselflies are present in their hundreds now and are the dominant species on the canal. Today there were many in mating circles, flying in tandem and ovipositing on emergent plants. Other damselflies commonly seen at the moment include the Large Red Damselfies (male + female), Blue-Tailed Damselflies (male + female - one female in the reddish rufescens form) and more rarely the Red-Eyed Damselfly.
Left: Female (rufescens form) Blue-Tailed Damselfly Right: Male Large Red Damselfly eating a housefly
Both Banded and Beautiful Demoiselles have been seen on occasion, usually single examples flying amongst the vegetation close to the canal water.
30 May 2005 - Montgomeryshire Canal, near Rhysnant Bridge, Four Crosses. A rare chance to see some unusual behaviour was recorded today. To my astonishment a female Red Eyed Damselfly was calmly detaching the head of an unfortunate male Azure Damselfly that she had clearly captured. Having eaten the head she proceeded to eat the thorax too! I have not read about red eyed damselflies predating azures before and would welcome comment from anyone who has seen similar behaviour. Here are the somewhat gruesome pictures.
Female Red-Eyed Damselfly eats male Azure Damselfly (click to enlarge)
29 May 2005 - The unseasonal cold weather, which included some localised frosts between the 15th-19th May, killed off a lot of the early emergences of the prior two weeks and populations declined dramatically until last week. There was a large, almost synchronised, emergence of Azure Damselfy on the Montgomeryshire Canal on 25th May with very large numbers present averaging 200+ per kilometre stretch. The Large Red Damselfly population averages 20 male and 5 female per km at the moment in warm sunny weather. Other visitors have included single female Beautiful Demoiselles (26th), Red Eyed Damselfly (26th) and two male Banded Demoiselles today. No aeshnids have been seen, but if the weather stays warm into the first two weeks of June we should see the Emperor Dragonfly emerging soon.
Male Banded Demoiselle (click to enlarge)
14/15th May 2005 - Sunday was the hottest day of the year so far and there was a large amount of dragonfly activity on the Montgomeryshire Canal this weekend. Large Red and Azure damselflies dominate at the moment with the Large Reds displaying much mating activity with pairs flying in tandem before landing to mate in the wheel position (photo below). On Saturday there were at least 6 female and four male teneral Red-Eyed damselflies flying along the towpath hedge at Sunnymeade, Four Crosses. The male Red-Eyed in its teneral colouring is very similar to the pale green female with a black upper abdomen and none of the blue colouring or intense red eyes that it adopts in adult form. They can be very difficult to tell apart from the female for this reason, but the teneral male usually has two light pinkish segments at the end of the of abdomen which the female does not (see photos). I saw one teneral male Beautiful Demoiselle on the canal between Sunnymeade and Maerdy Bridge on Sunday and a possible female on the Saturday. The first Blue-Tailed Damselfly was seen on the canal on Sunday along with many teneral Large Reds.
Jane Wesson recorded a Beautiful Demoiselle at the Wern Claypits reserve and Azure, Blue-Tailed and Large Red damselflies on the canal towpath at Burgedin Locks on the 15th May.
Male and female Large Red Damselflies in mating wheel position to left and tandem position to right (click to enlarge)
Red Eyed Damselfly - female left, male right (click to enlarge)
10 May 2005 - A warm day with full sunshine and there was a big damselfly presence on the Montgomeryshire Canal today. Azure tenerals and Large Red Damselflies were very prominent at Four Crosses. While the azures were still clearly emerging today the Large Reds appear to be more mature and have full adult colouring, so they are probably a few days old. Jane Wesson recorded Large Reds and Azure damselflies on Llyn Coed Y Dinas at the pond on the south side of the lake. Here are some pictures taken today of an adult male and female Large Red Damselfly.
Large Red Damselfly (Male left, Female right) Click to enlarge.
7 May 2005 - Despite the wind, showers and cold today a number of male and female Azure Damselfly tenerals have been seen on the wing along the Montgomeryshire Canal between the Rhysnant bridge and Maerdy bridge at Four Crosses. This sighting is just four days earlier than last years first record for the azures on the 11th May. Exuviae can be seen on emergent plants close to the canal towpath. Here are some photos taken today..
Teneral male Azure Damselfly (click all pictures to enlarge)
Teneral female Azure Damselfly (left normal markings, right variant markings)
1 May 2005 - And so another recording year comes around! We are off to a good start in 2005 thanks to a short report on last years records that I wrote for the Dragonfly Recording Network (DRN) newsletter Darter. This was sent out to British Dragonfly Society members earlier this month and has prompted three recorders to offer their much needed support and access to their records which can now be added to the DRN database. Welcome then to Jane Kelsall (Welshpool), Clare Boyes (Middletown) Al Parrott (Penrhos, Sarnau). and Simon Spencer (county recorder for Butterflies).
Both Jane and Al have interesting records for the Club-tailed dragonfly, a species that is poorly recorded in the county and for which no proof of breeding exists. Jane saw one at Pool Quay on the River Severn in 1995 at SJ 265118. Al has recorded Club-tailed in 2001, 2002 and 2003 at Penrhos near Sarnau. Jane also confirmed Migrant Hawkers at Moel Y Garth near Welshpool on 16th August 2004. Clare has been recording dragonflies for the last ten years on the pond and stream in her garden at Middletown and has seen an impressive list of species including the Southern Hawker, Brown Hawker, Club-tailed dragonfly, Broad bodied Chaser, Common Darter, Ruddy Darter, Banded and Beautiful Demoiselles, Emerald Damselfly, Large Red, Blue Tailed, Azure and Common Blue.
The earliest record in the county for the Ruddy Darter has now been pushed back a few years. While my previous sightings recorded in 2003 are the first records for the Montgomeryshire Canal, Clare first saw a female Ruddy Darter at Middletown on 10th July 1999.
Simon is the county recorder for Butterflies and may have seen a new and very rare species for the county a few years ago when he recorded a possible Small Red Damselfly on a bog near Cefn Cleisiog, Llanfihangell SJ SJ087163 in late June/early July. This will need to be verified this year if possible and a field trip is planned.
Congratulations to Clare also for recording the first dragonfly of 2005, a teneral Large Red Damselfly on 24/4/2005 at Middletown. This is a very early record indeed for this species in Montgomeryshire, possibly the earliest (have you confirmed that yet Clare?).
The first record on the Montgomeryshire Canal was this morning when a teneral Large Red sailed past me on a gust of wind near Rhysnant Bridge, Four Crosses.
Our first field trip as a group will probably be to one, or both, of the Club-tailed dragonfly locations at the end of May (Al - can you get in touch with your locations?) to try and confirm whether they are breeding in the county (observations of exuviae or emergence) and to get some photographs. If there is time a visit to the Montgomeryshire Canal will also be made on the same day.
For anyone else viewing the website let us know when you see the earliest dragonflies appear in your area and which species they are (reports can be sent online on the Submit Records page). At the moment the first species you are likely to see is the Large Red Damselfly over this weekend and the first three weeks in May. Below are photos of the newly hatched (teneral) form and the adult form.
Young (teneral) Large Red Damselfly Click to enlarge
Adult male Large Red Damselfly Click to enlarge
I have added some changes to the website including the new Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) page and further changes will be made over the weekend which update the resident species pages and add species photos. The form will also change over the next week if I can get to grips with the script that runs in the background!
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