Okay, the title is a little misleading as I really have no idea how to train a dragonfly – these guys just seem happy to pose for the camera for some reason. They sometimes even reposition themselves closer. Perhaps they see beautiful dragonflies reflected in the lens and are curious? Anyway, I have taken so many images I thought I would post a few more.
(There is no dragonfly in the above picture, obviously)
© Karen McRae, 2013
The dragonflies have been amazing this year. I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many. In fact, as I sit writing this post I can see them flitting around outside my window.
They have been gathering on the sun drenched bushes and shrubs allowing me to observe them rather closely (I’d venture to say that they are willing collaborators, one of them even perched on my nose for a while …). Mostly they are a yellow-green colour but there are a few other types, too, and they are all fascinating up close.
When we were canoe camping in Killarney a couple of weeks ago I saw a several cast off larval skins from dragonflies and here is one pictured below.
Dragonflies in their larval stage live underwater and when they are ready to metamorphose into adults they climb out of the water on an available reed or water plant and go through the process of emerging from their old skin.
Near the shed skin was this poor dragonfly caught in some sticky carnivorous sundews (Drosera). Sundews are rather beautiful, I will have to head to the bog one day and see if I can find some locally.
[These above 2 photographs are lacking detail as I didn’t bring a macro lens camping (all other images were taken with a macro lens), and my canoe kept shifting around – next time I think the extra weight of the macro lens would be completely worth it!]
A whiskered closeup:
(click on images to enlarge)
© Karen McRae, 2013
draw and shoot 