Arriving at Brazos Bend State Park near Houston, the first creature I saw was this dragonfly sunning itself, sitting obligingly still for this photo.
Trying to ID it using my book of insects, with illustrations, makes me pretty certain it’s an Emperor Dragonfly, even though the book only covers European insects. The description given fits though, “male, easily identified by deep blue abdomen with black line…”
There are birds and butterflies in the US which have different names in Europe, so I’m happy that it’s an Emperor and will go with that. But what about this one? It was sunning itself nearby and I can’t see anything like it in my insect book….
I suspect this one is a native of the southern US States. Any suggestions?
As far as I can see, the web/Wiki is not very useful for identifying dragonflies, which is my usual method. There aren’t many popular pics of the green one. I’d have guessed it must be called a ‘green dragonfly’, but can’t find evidence of that.
Your blue one might be a Common Green Darner Dragonfly, which is on Wikipedia. Also, according to Wiki, the Emperor is European/African. Of course they are probably closely related and maybe even the same!
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