Yesterday we were blessed with a sunny, warm day. The temperatures rose to over 60 degrees (16 degrees C) and my hopes that I might see some dragonflies increased correspondingly.
This autumn season we have already had some sub-freezing temperatures and even a couple of inches of snow. However, my past experience has shown that Autumn Meadowhawk dragonflies (Sympetrum vicinum) are unusually hardy.
Autumn Meadowhawks are small, about 1.3 inches (33 mm) in length and tend to perch on the ground, which is now covered with fallen leaves and other debris. As a result, it is pretty hard to spot these little dragonflies, despite their bright red coloration.
I searched and searched and eventually found a few of them at Occoquan Bay National Wildlife Refuge. I was able to capture a number of images and decided to feature this one, because it gives you a good look at the dragonfly’s beautiful two-toned eyes.
Today we are back to cooler temperatures and there is snow in the forecast for this weekend. Will this be my last dragonfly of the season? I will continue to search for dragonflies for another month or so, though I know that my chances of finding one of these beautiful aerial acrobats will continue to drop.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 
He is really hard to see in that photo, Mike. I’m surprised you found him.
I say him land, but had trouble seeing him initially when I was looking through the viewfinder of my camera. If he had been still the whole time, I doubt I would have been able to detect him.
Wow, I didn’t know dragonflies could take that kind of cold.
Nice shot!
Nice find! A week ago or so, I noticed a couple of dragonflies by us. To far away to ID, but saw them flying around. But I did find a whole bunch on my computer from August that I have not gotten around to processing! Does that count?
🙂 Yeah, that counts, though I always like to go off in search of new ones. Behaviorists call the phenomenon “recency bias”–we tend to give more importance to something that is new and forget that something older may be even better.
It would be enormous at 33cm Mike! Hehe!
[…] 3rd of December. If you want a sneak preview of what an Autumn Meadowhawk looks like, check out the December 2018 blog posting of that late […]