DRAGONFLIES JEWELS IN MY NATIVE GARDEN! (© Joni L. James) I have been documenting all the wildlife that I find in my native garden. This is a selection of dragonflies (and a damselfly) I have discovered in my native plot. See names below. Dragonflies are my favorite insect. They are beautiful creatures and cannot not sting or bite. They are efficient predators of numerous insects. Dragonflies can fly forward at about 100 body-lengths per second, and backwards at about 3 body-lengths per second. They are also capable of hovering in the air for about a minute. Longer periods of stagnant flight would interfere with thermoregulation. Each compound eye is composed of nearly 28,000 individual units (ommatidia), and together the eyes cover most of the head. More than 80% of their brain is devoted to analyzing visual information. Photos are of the following species (see individual images for names). Black Saddlebags (Tramea lacerata); Widow Skimmer (Libellula luctuosa); Eastern Pondhawk (Erythemis simplicicollis); and Damselfly-- Eastern Forktail (Ischnura verticalis) (Not totally certain of ID on this one--they are tricky.
Posted on: Sun, 03 Aug 2014 20:33:54 +0000
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