The Variegated Meadowhawk has a medium size body, patterned abdomen, tinted veins on the leading edge of all four wings, stigmas (pigment dots at the wing tips) that shade from pale to dark to pale, and yellow spots on the sides of the thorax. Adult meadowhawks may be found hunting away from water or hanging around the lake shores and ponds where they will lay their eggs in late summer.
Mosaic darners are a group that includes about 20 darners in North America—darners whose abdomens are decorated with “a mosaic” of blue/green/gray lines and speckles. The size, shape and color of the stripes on the thorax are important field marks. Sexual dimorphism runs rampant, with females of some species having as many as three different color phases (blue, green and yellow)—all of them distinct from the coloring of the males.
It’s been a remarkable year for dragonflies in southeastern Wisconsin. They made the print and television news in early August, when green darners, appearing in huge swarms, were hailed as saviors from the flood plain mosquitoes that had just emerged in cosmic numbers. These impressive sights only happen when the ecological “planets” are aligned just right, and they may not recur for years.
Today we take to the air with three big dragonflies that belong to a group called the King Skimmers; 12-Spotted Skimmer, Common Whitetail, and Widow Skimmer. Represented by 103 species in North America, the Skimmer family (Libellulidae) contains our most common and conspicuous dragonflies.
The BugLady has been a fan of predators since she was old enough to lisp out the word. She likes the cuts of their collective jibs and their matter-of-fact fierceness. To her, the “eat-ers” are far more interesting than the “eat-ees.”
Pennants are smallish dragonflies and there are just eight species in the genus. Most members of the genus are more eastern, but the ranges of the Calico and the Halloween take them southwest into the Great Plains. They are found near/lay their eggs in slow-moving to still waters. Several sources said that the young/naiads of these Pennants are not very competitive, and as such they are more successful in newer waters (burrow pits, ditches, etc). The naiads are great vegetation climbers and not-so-great swimmers.
The Dot-tailed Whiteface Dragonfly is a member of the Skimmer family, Libellulidae. There are over a thousand species in this brightly-colored family gracing the skies worldwide. A tenth of those are native to North America, making Skimmers the largest American dragonfly family. DtWfs enjoy most kinds of quiet waters—bogs, marshes, swamps, sloughs, farm ponds, and even very slow streams—s long as there are low aquatic plants to perch on.
Skimmers make up the largest family of dragonflies, with more than 100 species in North America. Many come with arresting colors and/or patterns on both wings and body. Their flight is rapid and eccentric, and they may brake and hover. Like all dragonflies, both the adults and naiads are unapologetic carnivores. Today’s trio—the Four-spotted Skimmer, the Blue Dasher, and the Slaty Skimmer, show some of the diversity of the skimmers.
Black Saddlebags are known for spending the greater part of each day in flight, rarely perching. They are strong flyers, and their flight is described as a “flap-glide” that may reach 17 mph. They patrol fields and pond edges for their prey—soft bodied flying insects like moths and mosquitoes which they eat on the wing—and large swarms of feeding males have been reported. The dark patches/bands on the wide hind wings shade their abdomens on sunny days.
Meadowhawks are common, colorful, a shade less than 1 ½ inches long, with red/yellow-orange abdomens and reddish/chestnut/rusty brown eyes. A few species are sexually dimorphic—the males and females are different colors. They like a variety of wetlands, though they are often found far from water. Meadowhawks tend to perch horizontally, often on the ground or on low vegetation, but some queue up in good numbers on telephone lines.