I am a bit late with this update (things were hectic around the BioBlitz), so I apologize, but I wanted to tell everyone about a few fun dragonfly educational events I had last month. About a month ago one of the local Master Naturalist Groups, the Historic Rivers Master Naturalists, invited me to give a lecture on dragonflies and to take a group out on a dragonfly field day. I will take any opportunity I can to talk about dragonflies, so I of course agreed. I truly enjoyed both activities and hope that the members were able to get some new information from my talk – they definitely already know their stuff!
We spent about three hours in Colby Swamp down in Freedom Park and were able to spot several different dragonfly and damselfly species, both as adults and as nymphs. Some notable sightings were one Comet Darner (Anax longipes) and one Variable Dancer (Argia fumipennis), neither of which I had spotted there before. There was far less emergent vegetation than in the past and the water level was much higher than our boots, so we were unable to venture far into the swamp, but we still had a wonderful time. Freedom Park and Colby Swamp have some truly amazing dragonfly diversity and I highly recommend people have a look at the area if they have any interest in seeing some great species.
Thank you to the Historic Rivers Master Naturalists for hosting me and thank you to Shirley Devan and Jeanette Navia for sharing many of the photographs below with me.
If you're interested in doing a dragonfly or aquatic insect field day for your group or your class, please feel free to reach out to me via email at Amanda.Whispell@ColonialSWCD.org or phone at (757) 778-5348.
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