Yesterday afternoon (from roughly 4 to 6:30), with the weather mostly sunny and the temperature in the low 80s, I headed to Powermill Pond for some odeing.
I parked the truck at Elmwood Junction and after a quick look around the waters edge and the road there, I headed down the trail (old rail bed) towards the bridge across the river. My ultimate goal was the field at the Cilley Family Forest (formerly the Robertson farmstead) in Greenfield. Google maps indicates the walk is about nine tenths of a mile one way.
I found a single female whiteface near the water where I parked and nothing along the road (which is usually a good spot for odes). On the way out, odes were sparse along the rail bed until I got to the bridge. Here I observed a half dozen or so male common pondhawks and a similar number of slaty skimmers.
At the field , the most common odes were Halloween pennants; I saw somewhere between six and twelve individuals. All of those I got close enough to see well were yellow (i.e. either immature males or females). There, I also observed a single male calico pennant and two stream cruisers (the one I photographed was male).
On the way back to the truck, the odes were a bit more numerous along the rail bed. In addition to the common pondhawks by the bridge, I found a single clubtail, a male chalk-fronted corporal and a male blue dasher.
Nine species of dragonflies on a two mile walk… not bad. Interestingly, I saw no damselflies. However, I did photograph a butterfly!
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The Odes are back!!! And, in color! And not done via camera obscura!
Typical Frank Gorga captures of these critters – simply amazing!
Comment by Joe Kennedy — 19 July 2019 @ 10:01 AM