The Golden Orange Female Dragonfly With Dark Wing Tips

This golden orange dragonfly is good looking, isn't it?

This dragonfly had been spotted back in July while on a dragonfly hunting trip with Robin and Wei Ling.  After taking a few photos each, we stood around the dragonfly and tried to figure out which dragonfly species this could be.  The markings on the wing tips had us thinking for a minute that perhaps it is the female of the Cratilla metallica.....

But then Robin asked, "Isn't the female Cratilla metallica darker in colour?  Can you remember?"  I tried to search the images in my head and think, but was uncertain.  We could not be entirely sure of the id of this dragonfly.  Robin was quite certain it is possibly another species.

And thanks to Robin, he had recently had Rory Dow confirm the id of this dragonfly to be the female of the Lyriothemis biappendiculata of the family Libelliludae.

So here's another species to add to the Checklist for Langkawi.  Yippeeeee!

Thanks a million to both Robin and Wei Ling!

Libellulidae - Potamarcha congener

Potamarcha congener

I was on my way to the park entrance and was walking past a row of parked cars, most of them with the windscreen wipers all standing up.  This practice of lifting the wipers off the glass and leaving it standing up is based on the belief that it will prolong the lifespan of the wiper blades.

Anyway, I then realised there was a dragonfly perched on one of these windscreen wipers.

 

 

I looked further up along the row of parked cars and there were dragonflies there too.

 

 

So I turned around to look at the ones I had walked past and there was a dragonfly on almost every windscreen wiper as well. 

 

 

I have been keeping an eye out for insects and birds, looking at trees and shrubs but not at these cars and that's where all the dragonflies are perched.  I just had to laugh then!

Each and every dragonfly perched on these wiper blades is the Potamarcha congener of the family Libellulidae.  The male has hindwing length of 33-34 mm.  It has blue pruinescence on its thorax and base of its abdomen with parallel orange streaks on the distal part of the abdomen till S8.  This species is common in open, disturbed habitats and widespread in tropical Asia.

 

 

The female is brown and obscurely marked.

 

 

I had first come across this species over a year ago and do not recall why I have not mentioned it before. 

Anyway, in recent weeks, I have been seeing lots of these dragonflies in many places.  I have seen quite a few pairs in wheel but could never get the chance to get any photos.  These dragonflies would be in wheel position and in flight for barely a minute and they would be out of it before you can even take a snap.

The female would then oviposit into the water by flipping the tip of its abdomen at various spots to scatter the fertilised eggs in the water while the male hovers overhead keeping guard.  The male dragonfly will chase away every dragonfly that comes near the female.

This female dragonfly was ovipositing into the pond.

 

 

There were certainly a lot of these dragonflies perched everywhere, mostly in high places.

 

 

 

Tinted Wings

 

I have taken quite a few shots of this dragonfly whenever I do see them around and I had first spotted them back in July last year.  On hot days, these dragonflies are often seen standing in the obelisk position as well.

 

 

These are the Brachythemis contaminata of the family Libellulidae.  They are quite small dragonflies with the male having hindwing length of only 22.5mm but they are easily recognised by their tinted wings of deep amber-orange hue.  The adult males have a deep orange coloured abdomen and can be easily spotted while the females and immature males are paler, tending more towards a brownish hue, their wings are still tinted, but less intense in colouration compared to the adult males.

 

 

The Brachythemis contaminata is a common species often found everywhere around ponds and they are even tolerant of polluted waters.

 

 

Another Prodasineura Damselfly

 

This charming little damselfly is the Prodasineura humeralis of the family Protoneuridae.  It has hindwing length of 18mm and is a slender and dark damselfly with yellow-orange markings on its thorax. 

Apart from the colour, its size and markings are very similar to the P. laidlawii, which is a striking blue, and was featured in this blog some months ago.  Check it out here.

The Pocket Guide lists five different species of the Prodasineura damselflies to be found in Peninsular Malaysia and Singapore.  I wonder how many of these five could be found in Langkawi?

Questions, questions and more questions...  All these questions that I ask myself of these dragonflies and damselflies and the only way to find the answers is to keep exploring and looking.  Didn't I already say that this project will see me through retirement?  Funny, eh?

Anyway, during the current hot and dry season, there are less dragonflies and damselflies to be seen.  The water level in ponds and streams have gone down in most places.  The blistering heat is also making it quite uncomfortable to stay out in the sun and observe these creatures for too long.

I am certainly looking forward to some rain soon.  And I can imagine all these insects and other creatures will be out rejoicing when the heat dissipates and everything turns green again!

 

 

A Colourful Find On A Cloudy Morning

It was cloudy, overcast and a bit gloomy this morning.  Since I was already up, I thought I might as well pay a visit to the pond anyway.

As I had thought, the place was quiet and full of inactivity.  And there was none of the usual chirping of birds to break the silence of the dawn and fill the air with greetings for a new day.

I saw only a few of the usual common odonata species hidden among the grasses, still waking up and getting warmed up for flight and I did not see the usual scene of dragonflies buzzing around patrolling their territories.  Nevertheless, there was a pair of Ischnura senegalensis in tandem, a pair of Pseudagrion microcephalum in wheel, a pair of Copera ciliata in tandem and a few of the Agriocnemis femina just starting to move about more actively.  I took a few photos of all of  them and continued walking around the pond.

Just when I thought that's about the most I will find for this morning, a spot of colours caught my eye.

 

 

This brightly coloured damselfly is the Ceriagrion cerinorubellum of the family Coenagrionidae.  The male of this species has hindwing length of 17mm.  According to the Pocket Guide, this is one of the commonest and most colourful member of its family and this damselfly is a ferocious predator, consuming teneral individuals and other damselflies larger than itself.

Yet this was the only damselfly of this species that I found.

 

 

It has amazing colours on the thorax and abdomen but its face has a "plasticky" appearance like the Ischnura senegalensis owing to the large mandibles that make up a big proportion of its face.  As you can see in the above photo, it gives the damselfly a seemingly savage look.

I guess its reputation as a ferocious predator explains why it was quite undeterred by me as I got closer to have a good look and take a few photos.  I could move about freely and this tiny damselfly did not even flutter away warily like some of the other species do.

It is as fearless as it looks!

 

 

Confusing Species...

There was this one afternoon when I came across so many differently coloured damselflies in the padi fields that I was just feeling surprised!

Are there really so many different species of damselflies here that I did not see till now?  Even if I eliminated the possibility of the male and female of a species having different colour forms, I still would have counted more than one species if they were different species at all?

These damselflies were so tiny.  And as it happened, it was rather breezy that afternoon that every blade of grass swayed in the hushest of breezes.  It made photographing them slightly difficult but not impossible.  What it needed was a bit more skills and definitely plenty of patience!

And as I have found out now, all those damselflies turned out to be of one single species after all...

What I have been talking about is the Agriocnemis femina of the family Coenagrionidae, which is one of the smallest species of damselflies that exist.  The hindwing length measures only 10mm and even the girth of its abdomen is just a fraction of that of the grass stem!

 

 

Never mind that it is the smallest species and you almost get cross-eyed trying to examine every feature with the naked eye, it is probably also one of the most confusing species for having so many different colour forms or colour changes with maturity and females being polymorphic as well.

Shown above is the mature male damselfly of this species with white pruinosity covering on its thorax, while captured below is a half-mature male of the same species.  You can see that the white pruinescence has not completely developed over its thorax and it has faint orange-reddish marking on the tip of the abdomen, similar to the full-grown adult male.

 

 

The next image shows an immature male having olive green markings on its thorax and with bright orange at the tip of its abdomen.  Besides it's small size, this orange marking is the only distinctive feature to differentiate it from the Ishnura senegalensis..

 

 

This damselfly that is almost all red is an immature female of the same species.  Its small size is a good differenting feature from other species.

 

 

And here's an adult female of the Agriocnemis femina.  Again, it is very similar to the Ischnura senegalensis, except for its tiny size.

 

 

All these photos were taken at a pond next to the padi fields.  This damselfly species breed in stagnant and slow-flowing water and is widespread in the Indo-Australian tropics.

What a day for Odonata identification!  For me, at least...