Friday, July 30, 2010

Dragonflies: Any port in a storm

I've noticed something interesting this summer about dragonflies.

I don't know where they live, or if they hatch in my tiny pond or if they're happy swooping through and eating mosquitoes, but I have noticed they come to my yard for shelter against big rainstorms.

Each time we've had a big thunderstorm looming, while I was in the yard I heard buzzing sounds and saw and huge dragonfly land on my tree, or under my honeysuckle arch. This time, though, I broke out my camera.

Warning: if dragonflies freak you out, you may want to go look at some kitties instead.



Click to enlarge for serious detail!

When I say huge I mean about 3-4 inches in length. To me, that's a big dragonfly.

Click to enlarge for serious detail!

Why my yard? Where are they all the rest of the day? Why aren't they eating more mosquitoes? How do I get them to hang around?

Then again, do I really want to be buzzed by suckers this big? Hmm...decisions, decisions!

On the bright side, I know that my yard is definitely in use as a wildlife sanctuary when the wildlife comes in from the rain.

By the way, it turns out that this is a Mosaic Darner. Cool, huh?

1 comment:

Candice Suter.....Sweetstuff said...

I like dragonflies but we don't have many around my house. We don't have any lakes or ponds near us. Wow those sound like big ones! Nice pics.

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