DRAGONFLY IN MY GARDEN


Pictures and information about the dragonflies and damselflies living in my garden


OK OK, I take it you have come from my homepage and are not interested in setting up a home business, but would rather learn about dragonflies. Just scroll down beneath my banner to find the interesting stuff.

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My pond is far more interesting and fun than any business proposition on my homepage but if I can get you to visit and buy stuff, I can spend longer on my pond and in the garden doing what I really enjoy - Get it? - Oh well, onto the fun stuff.


This is a photo taken of a southern hawker dragonfly that emerged from my garden pond this year (2006).
In truth, I was getting about one per day emerging for a period of about 2 weeks.
The pond is always full of dragonfly and damselfly nymphs, as well as newts and frogs. During the early summer, there are always at least 6 or 7 azure damselfly, a few small red damselfly and large red damselfly sitting on the lilies and nearby rocks. This year I saw for the first time a banded demoiselle damselfly guarding a territory above the pond. This was a little confusing because I thought they liked flowing water. Unfortunately, the dragonflies tend to come and to go and don't hang around for very long, making it difficult to get decent pictures.

The picture below is particularly interesting because the southern hawker dragonfly was laying eggs. - I was trying to get a photograph of it sitting on a bullrush but it would not hold its abdomen straight and kept twisting and turning it. I soon realised what it was doing and so took some pictures of it laying its eggs. If you look closely at the picture, it would appear that the southern hawker dragonfly is actually puncturing the leaf of the reed with its ovipositor. Is that a dragonfly egg just above it?

Southern Hawker Dragonfly

Southern Hawker Dragonfly laying eggs

I think that I have had 5 different species of dragonflies coming to my garden pond. They are the Southern Hawker Dragonfly, the Brown Hawker Dragonfly, the Emporer Dragonfly, the Common Hawker Dragonfly and the Common Darter Dragonfly. I think I was visited by an emperor dragonfly last year, it was enormous and mainly blue in colour. The emperor dragonfly flew around the garden a number of times and all I could hear was the droning of its wings - sort of like a small aircraft noise. It was quite an exceptional insect. Unfortunately it didn't land and I didn't get a chance to take a picture.

Last week, I think I saw a common darter dragonfly. At first I thought it was a large red damselfly, but looking closer (and then in my book), I have concluded that it was a common darter dragonfly. - It was just sat on a water lily leaf doing nothing, but typically, by the time I got back with the camera, it had gone!

As for the Brown Hawker dragonfly, I will let you draw your own conclusions. If you look at the picture below, you will see what I think is a brown hawker dragonfly that has just emerged from its nymph. - You can see the nymph cast just underneath the dragonfly. As an aside, I have never seen a dragonfly breaking out of its nymph skin, but it sure reminds me of the film Alien when I see the hole in the back of the nymph's body!!!

I have decided that this is a Brown Hawker dragonfly but if you look at the wings, you can see it is still very newly emerged and maybe it came out brown but changed colour after it flew off? Either way, I am rather proud of this photo, with the dragonfly and the nymph it has emerged from, in the same shot.

Brown Hawker Dragonfly and Nymph

Brown Hawker Dragonfly newly emerged from nymph - visible below
It was very exciting (and still is) when I first found a dragonfly that had emerged from the pond. I do have some real difficulties now when I need to tidy up the pond and thin out the weed. There are always loads of nymphs attached to the weed. Damselfy nymphs are very small when compared with the dragonfly nymphs. The easiest ones to tell are the mayfly nymphs as they have 2 or 3 tassles coming from the back of their tails. I have to spend ages gently tapping the weed against the edge of the pond so that I can throw back any nymphs that are attached.

As I mentioned earlier, there are always a number of damselflies around the pond in June and July. I think that I have seen 4 species although they are quite hard to tell apart until you take a photo and can look at a book!

I am fairly sure we get the Common Blue Damselfly as well as the Azure Damselfly, and of course the Large Red Damselfly and the Small Red Damselfly.

Large Red Damselfly

large red damselfly


Their mating habits are quite wierd. - The male damselfly appears to grab the female damselfly by the head and fly her around - dunking the female damselfly in the pond to lay her eggs. - They don't appear to be joined, as in mating, so you have to wonder why the male does this?

I have got a photo of this although you will need to look closely - The male small red damselfly has almost got the female's head under the water!!!!

Small Red Damselfly Mating


Small Red Damselfly male and female laying eggs


My favourite damselfly is the Azure Damselfly. I think it is rather beautiful. Its funny, some years there appear to be loads of these and others, very, very few. They tend to come a little bit later than the red damselfly and are particularly fond of warm and sunny weather - although it may of course be that I spend more time in the garden when it is warm and sunny so notice the azure damselfly more!

Azure Damselfly

Azure Damselfly


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It's amazing isn't it? - A dragonfly will lay it's eggs in a pond. Some of the eggs hatch, some just stay in the water overwinter and hatch the following spring.

The Nymphs are voracious ambush predators, eating smaller creatures than themselves, such as other insect larvae. Some species of dragonfly stay as nymphs for several years, getting larger and larger.

If they survive the predators in the pond, eg fish, frogs, tadpoles and other dragonfly nymphs, they will eventually crawl out of the water in the evening and emerge overnight from their nymph skin as a fully fledged dragonfly.

Be it a humble brown hawker dragonfly or the noble emporer dragonfly, it won't live more than a couple of months, feeding on other insects, breeding, laying its eggs and then dying. So the cycle goes on.....

Last but not least... Is this a brown hawker dragonfly or isn't it?

Brown Hawker Dragonfly ?

Picture of a Brown Hawker Dragonfly - I think

Copyright 2006 - all pictures and information is copyrighted. Permission is given for personal use but a backlink must be included if this article is reproduced.
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