Photographs by Frank

28 May 2010

Early Odonates

Filed under: Odontates,Southeastern MA,Wildlife — Tags: , — Frank @ 9:45 AM

One of my photographic passions (manias, according to Joan) are odontates (that is, dragonflies and damselflies)… you’ll see a lot of them if you follow this blog.

Mid-May is the beginning of odontate season in New England. So, I spent a bit of time over the past two days “hunting” dragonflies.  In addition to just getting outside and enjoying the spring, I wanted to test my new “odontate rig” which allows me to use my flash as I photograph these elusive creatures. Most of these photos were taken at Carver’s Pond (in Bridgewater, MA) but the first one was taken in the backyard.

This is an immature male common whitetail:

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A male bluet (probably an Atlantic Bluet)…

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and a female bluet (I’m unsure of the exact species)…

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As adult odontates are short lived, mating season begins quickly after the adults emerge from the larva as these fragile forktails show…

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As one wanders the woods hunting one group of animals, you often observe many other organisms doing their thing as this last photo shows…

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I think that these butterflies are mating, but I know even less about Lepidoptera than I do about Odonata! So remember, take all of my identifications with a grain of salt… after all,  I’m a chemist not a biologist!


1 Comment

  1. Frank I love the pictures. I wish I had known about the dragonflies last week, so I could have shown them to our 2nd graders who are studing life cycles. They would have gone great with a wonderful picture book I read to them last week entitled “Eliza and the Dragonfly”. Maybe I can incorporate some of your pictures next year when I do the life cycle unit again. – Cyndi

    Comment by Cyndi — 28 May 2010 @ 11:46 PM

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