Hampshire Dragonflies - Cadnam Common Pond 4th July

In my quest to see all of the regularly breeding dragonflies and damselflies in Hampshire this year I had tried a couple of sites for Emerald Damselfly but with no luck and so, with a tip off from Steve, I met Steve and Niall at Cadnam Common, a site that I had never visited before. From the roadside layby we headed out across the common to the rapidly shrinking pond where before very long Steve located Emerald Damselfly around a clump of Juncus. Over the next couple of hours we enjoyed the abundant insect life around this pond with a good range of Odonata, including my first Hampshire Common Darter of the year as well as a few notable flies - you gotta love flies to appreciate them!

Emerald Damselfly

Emerald Damselfly

Emerald Damselfly

Common Darter

Common Darter - A freshly emerged individual

Black-tailed Skimmer

Keeled Skimmer

Emperor Dragonfly

Small Red Damselfly

The localised Brown Heath Robberfly

The highly localised dung-fly Scatomyza scybalaria, a species requiring very wet, dung enriched mud in which to breed

Not an especially rare species but this large female Tabanus sudeticus was egg laying, a behaviour I had not observed before. The image below shows the completed egg mass.

Egg mass of Tabanus sudeticus

Hampshire Dragonflies and Damselflies - Ober Water 29th June

In really hot and humid conditions during the UK's second heatwave of the year I wandered Ober Water looking for White-legged Damselfly and Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly. The stream was absolutely heaving with Odonata and despite the heat it was an amazing location with Beautiful Demoiselle, White-legged Damselfly, Large Red Damselfly, Small Red Damselfly, Southern Damselfly, Azure Damselfly, Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly, Red-eyed Damselfly, Emperor Dragonfly, Gold-ringed Dragonfly, Downy Emerald and Keeled Skimmer being recorded - 12 species in total. Of my targets, White-legged Damselfly was present in abundance with many mating pairs while Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly was only seen in one small area (centred around 50.834124, -1.638628) with three males present. I was pleased to get back to the air conditioned car!

Beautiful Demoselle or the rare Hampshire Purslane

Small Red-eyed Damselfly

Large Red Damselfly

Downy Emerald - A rare view of a perched individual

White-legged Damselfly

White-legged Damselfly

Blue-tailed Damselfly

Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly

Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly

Ober Water & Silver Water, New Forest - 7th July

I had a spare morning and so decided to head into the New Forest to try and see Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly, a species I had tried for in the forest last year but failed to see. I tried Ober Water, a well known site for the species, parking at the Puttles Bridge car park south of the Rhinefield Hotel at SU271029. I then walked west along the Ober Water for around 2km, it was pretty tough going through heathland and bog and I was unsuccessful in my quest but did see a range of species including Beautiful Demoiselle, Gold-ringed Dragonfly, Keeled Skimmer, White-legged Damselfly, Small Red Damselfly, Large Red Damselfly, Black Darter and many Silver-studded Blue.

Female Keeled Skimmer - Ober Water, New Forest

Silver-studded Blue - Ober Water, New Forest

Silver-studded Blue - Ober Water, New Forest

Teneral Black Darter - Ober Water, New Forest

Small Red Damselfly - Ober Water, New Forest

Large Red Damselfly - Ober Water, New Forest

Female White-legged Damselfly - Ober Water, New Forest

Male White-legged Damselfly - Ober Water, New Forest

I then went onto Silver Water which flows south-west from the Puttles Bridge car park, this is also meant to be a good area for Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly and, in hindsight, the habitat close to Rhinefield Road appears suitable but I had no luck. I added Southern Damselfly and Azure Damselfly to the list of species for the morning.

Southern Damselfly - Silver Water, New Forest

Azure Damselfly - Silver Water, New Forest