Comparison of females of two similar species living on the same reservoir.
Right and bottom - Aeshna soneharai
Top and left - Aeshna mixta
identified by long male paraprocts (and a straight pronotum hind lobe)
Male Lestes sponsa in tandem with a young Sympecma paedisca.
On the right is a male Erythromma najas.
a female
a young female
Comparison of exuviae. On the left is Aeshna juncea, on the right A. crenata.
a male
They lay near the highway in a mix with the remains of A. viridis and A. grandis. In size, it is larger than both of these. The venation of the wings almost perfectly fits in A. serrata, only the brown and not the yellow costa confuses (but the wing was photographed inside out...). I will be happy to confirm the ID (this species has not been registered in the Vladimir region since 2005) or a reasoned refutation :)
A male Aeshna grandis caught a female of Libellula quadrimaculata in tandem.
July 2016.
Asby, Östergötland, Sweden.
A male damselfly lands on top of a male dragonfly, and tries to form a tandem. I have more pictures, but unfortunately the damselfly is more or less blurred by movements, as I opted for a small aperture just before the damselfly appeared.
May 2011, Rössjöholm, Sweden.
I present to you: the largest dragonfly in the world, featuring my face for size comparison! :P Photos simply don't convey its sheer size and bulk but hopefully having something for comparison helps.
Anyway, story time! This guy was flying around erratically for at least an hour and a half since we arrived - I assume due to the missing wing half. I hadn't seen it myself but a couple of my friends had, and it somehow hit me in the side of the head and quickly flew off. :P
Anyway, while we were all chilling around the river, it decided to fly straight into the waterfall (in the background in pic 3) and was promptly swept downstream. What else could I do?? I jumped in and chased after it! 😂
As you can tell from the photos, my swim was successful, and I ended up with the most enormous dragonfly I have ever seen right before me. :P I can't even properly describe how enormously huge it was. And those amazing cerci! I gave it some time to dry off, but being humid tropical Queensland, it wasn't happening very quickly. It was more than happy to sit on my hand and so I wondered if it would prefer somewhere a bit higher and drier :P
So that is how it ended up on my face! As it dried and we were plagued by march flies, the obvious solution was to give him one to eat. He accepted it gratefully and somehow ate the entire thing in a single bite. Hopefully that goes a way into showing just how huge and formidable these guys are! Not content, he then sliced his huge mandibles into my nose -_- and had to be gently prized off. He slowly lapped up blood for a while after but luckily didn't do any more biting! If I squint in the mirror I can still see a faint line there now :P
He sat for about an hour before we had to leave and I left him on a shrub. I hope he was okay with half a wing missing, but there wasn't much else I could do. All in all one of the best experiences of my life! :D
First photo is by Haley Harding because I am incapable of taking selfies :P
a male
The first find in Russia after the description of the species by Bartenev in 1929 from the vicinity of Sochi (near Lake Kardyvach).
Comparison of species.
left Aeshna serrata
On the right is Aeshna crenata
The difference in the color of the abdomen of males of similar species. Bottom and left A. soneharai, top and right A. mixta.
https://complete.bioone.org/journals/odonatologica/current
Стрелка Изящная (Ischnura elegans). Самка.
Самец другого вида - Лютки-Невесты (Lestes sponsa). Перепутал невесту.