yet more damselfies

25.06.2010

while attempting to photograph these little creatures,
I became a little sidetracked by the banded demoiselles.

When perched on a leaf they obviously present a pretty picture.
In flight their wings seemed to act like helicopter rotors.

That was it, I had to capture one in flight.

here's one at rest

in flight, look at the helicopter wings!

here, we have a female banded demoiselle.

another variation, here I think we have a ruddy darter.
My trusty nature book leads me to this identification -see bottom of posting.

this is a mystery bug, anyone got any ideas?
There are so many minute creatures whizzing about and they all seen to be tiny,
fast and hard to capture, with a camera, a net may be more successful.

here's another, sitting on a lily pad -not found it in my book, yet.

my trusty book by the way: the Collins Complete British Wildlife by Paul Sterry.
It's really useful as identifying photographs convey exactly what one sees in the field.
I found one cheap in a garden centre last year. Have a look for it.