30 Jun 19 - Little White Legs

I had spent most of my visit to Longham Lakes to look for & photograph Red-veined Darters. However, I did spent a few minutes photographing this White-legged Damselfly.

White-legged Damselfly

Also, there were good numbers of Common Blue Damselflies in the grassy edges to the lakes.

Common Blue Damselfly

28 Nov 14 - Insect Photospot4 - Dorset Damselflies

This is the second Dragonfly Photospot, covering the Damselflies & Demoiselles that are found in Dorset. The main aim is to give the readers an appreciation of the variety of species that can be seen in Dorset, rather than focusing on the identification. There are plenty more photos of these species as well as useful identification features in earlier Posts: just click on the Label links on the right hand side of the Blog.

Banded Demoiselle: Male. This is a common species on a number of the clean Dorset rivers. Throop Mill (23 June 14)

Banded Demoiselle: Female. White Mill, Sturminster Marshall (28 June 14)

Beautiful Demoiselle: Male. This is more of a heathland pond species. Rempstone Forest (3 Aug 14)

Emerald Damselfly: Male. Currently, this is the only Emerald Damselfly found in Dorset, but there are other species that have recently colonised Kent & East Anglia and hopefully in time, they will reach Dorset. Rempstone Forest (3 Aug 14)

Emerald Damselfly: Female. Rempstone Forest (3 Aug 14)

White-legged Damselfly: Male. Canford School Water Meadows (29 June 14)

White-legged Damselfly: Female. Canford School Water Meadows (29 June 14)

Red-eyed Damselfly: This species seems to really like resting on water lilies well away from the water's edge. Throop Mill (23 June 14)

Red-eyed Damselfly: Mating Pair. Throop Mill (23 June 14)

Small Red-eyed Damselfly: This species is less widespread than Red-eyed Damselfly in Dorset with the Weymouth area being one of the more reliable sites to see it. It is a species I have yet to photograph

Large Red Damselfly: East Holme Water Meadows (6 June 14)

Large Red Damselfly: Mating Pair. Brownsea (21 June 14)

Small Red Damselfly: This species is smaller & daintier than Large Red Damselfly and is a heathland specialist. Arne (11 July 14)

Blue-tailed Damselfly: This is the common Blue-tailed Damselfly species in Dorset. Bestwall (19 June 14)

Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly: This is a rarer of the two Blue-tailed Damselfly species in Dorset with a limited number of sites. It likes good boggy conditions or habitats with open edges to water and doesn't seem to be much of a flier compared to its commoner relative (4 Aug 14)

Common Blue Damselfly: Male. White Mill, Sturminster Marshall (28 June 14)

Azure Damselfly: Arne (8 June 14)

Southern Damselfly: This is the scarce species of the three Blue Damselflies. The main features to separate the 3 Dorset Blue Damselflies can be found here (9 July 12)

12 July 14 - An Audience With The Emperor

Off to the woods today with my mate, Peter Moore, to look for Purple Emperor: the largest of the UK breeding Butterflies. Not an easy species to see as they don't start flying till mid to late morning & when flying they like to hang around the tree tops, especially Oak trees. They are also prone to long afternoon siestas. Also they are not the most common of Butterflies where they occur. Unlike most Butterflies, they don't come to nectar for a sugar fix & that again reduces the chances of seeing them low down. However, they will come to the ground on occasions, especially if there are horse or dog faeces present. Typically, it's a wood that doesn't seem to have any bridlepaths. It turned out to be a day out for a few of the other Dorset Birders who do Butterflies, so a chance to catch up with a few mates. Not that we had a lot of time to chat before the action began & all too soon ended.

Purple Emperor

I was pleased when I saw this one & even more pleased to get some photos, given how tricky they can be to see. We gave it another hour, but there were no further sightings. After that, we spent more time looking elsewhere in the wood where others had seen them on previous days, but no joy. 

Silver-washed Fritillary: There were plenty of these to distract me. A different view, as there have been a few Silver-washed Fritillary photos on the blog in recent days

It would have been good to see a Purple Emperor on the ground, but I guess I will have to spend more time looking. Still it was good to see one, given I haven't seen any since the mid 80's, mainly due to lack of looking. This was my 47th species of Butterfly in Dorset: just Silver-spotted Skippers of the regular species to see. After that, I'm going to need to see some rarities in the county or hope that somebody discovers a new site for Wood White or Pearl-bordered Fritillaries: both of which are probably no longer found in Dorset.

Peter had to be back for family stuff by mid afternoon, but there was time for a quick look for something else. We decided on White-legged Damselflies at the Canford School Water Meadows, which I had recently seen, as it was a tick for Peter. It only took us several minutes from leaving the car to find one: due to having to walk through inappropriate habitat before we reached their favourite area. The sort of cooperation that is appreciated, when time is short. 

White-legged Damselfly: Male

White-legged Damselfly: Male

29 June 14 - Photographing White Legs

Off to the River Stour water meadows next to Canford School in Canford Magna. There is a suspension bridge over the river onto the water meadows on the North side of the river where there is a public footpath. This was to specifically look for White-legged Damselflies, which my mate Kevin had seen a number of the previous weekend.

The River Stour: A great looking river

The River Stour

The White-legged Damselflies habitat: They were resting in the rough grass alongside these banks of Stinging Nettles

Another view of the White-legged Damselfly grass habitat

There were about 10 White-legged Damselflies present. While they were happily perching on the long grass. When disturbed they disappeared back into the Stinging Nettles beyond a barbed wire fence. But given a few minutes, they did return. Superfically, they are another small blue Damselfly, but when they are seen really well, they are quite distinctive & great looking Damselflies.

White-legged Damselfly: Male. Note, the distinctive inverted Y markings on the abdomen

White-legged Damselfly: Male. Very distinctive white legs and obvious orange brown pterostigma

White-legged Damselfly: I'm assuming this is an immature female, but the blue spot on the thorax is interesting

White-legged Damselfly: Another immature female

28 June 14 - The Moral Of Not Carrying The Book

After some help from my mate Kevin, I was off to try another site on Dorset's River Stour. This is further upstream on the site tried on the 23rd for White-legged Damselfly & near to the large village of Sturminster Marshall. After driving through the large village of Sturminster Marshall, the road crossed the Stour next to the White Mill. There is a small National Trust car park here. Walking upstream & away from the Mill, for about 50 metres brought me to a path leading to the river bank. Very quickly, the path opens up into the first of several fields alongside the river bank. This is the site for the White-legged Damselflies. There are a lot of Stinging Nettles alongside the river as well as areas of other plants & bushes, but the vegetation in the first field had been severely strimmed. There were excellent numbers of Banded Demoiselles along the full length of the main river bank with about 10 or so Scarce Chasers in the first field & an Emperor Dragonfly hawking over the river. The path then carried in into a couple of short grass Cow fields. The Stinging Nettles along the riverbed edge of the fields were good for Banded Demoiselles, but little else.

Looking downriver along the main river bank

Looking upriver along the main river bank

Little Egret: Closer to the Mill. Once a national rarity, now a common sight in Dorset

Mallard: Male entering its dull eclipse plumage which they adopt during their moult phase (when the replace their feathers)

By the entrance into the first Cow field, there is an alternative path into long, thin sided field of rough grass with a sloping bank alongside an overgrown ditch. There were about 6 Common Blue Damselflies & one White-legged Damselfly in the long grass in this field. Despite checking the book before I left the house, I ended up failing to appreciate the potential confusion of the immature female Common Blue Damselfly (which look different from the mature blue females). As a result, I ended photographing a couple of Damselflies, thinking they were White-legged Damselfies, which I later reidentified as Common Blue Damselflies (when I checked the photos against the book). I did manage to see & photograph a real White-legged Damselfly, but the photos aren't as good as they would have been, had I realised my error at the time: as I would have spent longer photographing it. Still I always think you learn, & more importantly remember, more by making these mistakes. It also shows the importance of having a camera to get some photos of these insects to be able to check all the features. 

The side field: This looked more interesting habitat & I did finally see one White-legged Damselfly in the long grass, with a couple of immature female Common Blue Damselflies

Common Blue Damselfly: Male. Nice & easy to identify as lots of blue on the abdomen and the head & shoulders marking on the second segment (which separates it from the other small blue Damselflies)

Common Blue Damselfly: Immature female Common Blue Damselfly. Mature adult females would still be as bright blue as the males. They have this missile like marking on their abdomen and crucially some white on the legs

Common Blue Damselfly: Another photos of the immature female Common Blue Damselfly. Again note the white on the legs

White-legged Damselfly: The legs are more white, the tops of the eyes are blue & the pterostigma markings are light brown (black on Common Blue Damselfly)

The Scarce Chasers & the Banded Demoiselles were dominating the main river bank. The Scarce Chasers were very active and rarely settled. When they did settle, they would fly at the slightest movement even several metres from them. When they met another male, both would go an impressively fast vertical climb for about 20 metres, in an attempt to other climb each other.

Scarce Chaser: Male. Due to the angle of this photo it's not possible to see the black base to the hind wing. However, the lack of yellow-orange edges to the sides of the abdomen & the dark pterostigma still confirms it is a Scarce Chaser

Scarce Chaser: Male. This tatty male shows how limited the black on the hind wing is the Scarce Chasers here 

Scarce Chaser: Male. Finally a head on view

Banded Demoiselle: Male

Banded Demoiselle: Female. We think they look great, the Bug this female is eating wouldn't have agreed they are anything other than dangerous predators

Banded Demoiselle: Female. I couldn't resist a final photo

The sunny conditions were also good for Butterflies. There were reasonable numbers of Small Tortoiseshells, a few Red Admirals & Meadow Browns & a Green-veined White.

Green-veined White

Red Admiral

Red Admiral: They become a lot more cryptic when they close their wings up

Small Tortoiseshell: Although not as common as they were when I was a kid, this species seems to be around in better numbers than recent years