(We were there in mid-afternoon, on a baking hot day. It's not a good time for birding, but it sure was for bugs of all types!)
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Male bluet. There must have been hundreds of these. Every photo taken over the water had many tiny flashes of blue, as they zipped back and forth, rarely stopping. |
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A female of the same species, not nearly as gaudy as her mate. |
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Skimmer, possibly the four-spotted skimmer, pausing briefly on dried grass. |
And a sad story. There were many very small damselflies along the edge of the water, too small and too fast to get a good look at them. I got the impression of colourless wings vibrating at great speed, and not much else, until one landed right in front of me.
Unfortunately, the chosen landing spot was booby-trapped, and within seconds, a spider dropped down and sunk her fangs into the damselfly. It struggled wildly, twisting and shaking, only entangling itself even more. And the one half-decent photo I got shows more of the spider than of the fly.
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The spider is another of the cross spiders. Very happy, not cross at all. |
The damselfly has a black back, greenish-yellow underside, green and yellow eyes and legs. The wings are distinctive; just a cheese-cloth weave with a tiny brownish diamond near the tip. I have submitted it to BugGuide, without much hope of an identification, but you never know; those people are geniuses!
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