Petaltail dragonflies, again, get their name from the shape of their tails which are long and straight like petals. These dragonflies belong to the Petaluridae family, which is said to be the oldest among the dragonfly families approximately million years.
There are 11 documented species of this family recorded in the world, the largest of which is found in Australia. The curious thing about petaltails is that they can be found around fens when they are growing up, as opposed to most other dragonfly types that are found in water habitats.
Perhaps as a result of this, these dragonflies take longer than most to mature into adults. Hawker is a common name for the types of dragonflies belonging to the family Aeshnidae. The genera in this family are also said to be the fastest flying dragonflies. These dragonflies can commonly be found in North America and are believed to be the largest dragonfly types in the world.
There are several interesting things about hawkers, including but not limited to the fact that they mate mid-flight and then lay eggs somewhere nearby, preferably in the water. There is also evidence that suggests female hawkers can fake death to avoid the advances of a male they don't consider suitable for mating.
Tigertails is the common name for dragonflies that belong to the Sythemistidae family. The family has about 43 species, of which tigertails are a prominent variety. Tigertails look quite similar to species in the corduliidae and gomphidae families of dragonflies. These are small dragonflies with a slender abdomen. Tigertails are one of the oldest species of dragonflies and are most commonly found in Australia and New Guinea. They like to be around lakes, small streams, ponds or any other water body with slow-moving water.
They get their name from the combination of yellow and black stripes on their tail. Saddlebags are a species of dragonflies that are commonly found in Canada, the United States, and the south of Mexico.
These dragonflies also belong to the Libellulidae family. This species of dragonflies are known to migrate, frequenting the North in the spring and moving towards the Atlantic coast in the fall. An interesting thing to note about saddlebags is that they are also known as dancing gliders because they cupulate and lay eggs through a mating dance. They are especially useful to control a growing mosquito population.
Like hawkers, darners also belong to the Aeshnidae family. They have a striking black body with distinct blue spots. They can commonly be found in the United States, typically around water bodies like lakes, ponds and streams. There are several varieties of darners and though they have several different features, they share several things in common which categorizes them into the same family. While most males in the species have bright blue dots on their abdomen or thorax, the females have spots in hues of yellow or green.
Unlike most other species of dragonflies, darners do not have thoracic stripes on the top or the bottom, which is another unique identification that sets them apart. Called naiads or nymphs, these larvae stay in the water for up to three years, hunting aquatic insects, mosquito larvae, or small fish with a lower jaw that reaches out and opens up sideways, snatching prey into their mouths.
They may even cannibalize other dragonfly nymphs. Nymphs propel themselves quickly by sucking water into their abdomen and then spitting it out. They undergo between six and 15 molts before emerging as fully formed adult dragonflies, a process that takes about 12 hours. Adults live only about a month, hunting flies, mosquitos, and midges.
Their arms slant upward, forming a type of basket and enabling them to scoop up prey in flight. Adults also look for opportunities to mate. When he finds a receptive female, he grasps her behind her head with claspers at the tip of his abdomen, and the two fly off together.
Sometimes they will mate in the air. Mating takes just a few seconds, after which the female can immediately lay her eggs. Dragonflies are important to their environments both as predators particularly of mosquitos and as prey to birds and fish. Because these insects require stable oxygen levels and clean water , scientists consider them reliable bioindicators of the health of an ecosystem. In , the first comprehensive assessment of insect species showed that 10 percent of dragonfly species were under threat of extinction.
The animals are imperiled by destruction of freshwater habitats—particularly ponds, bogs, and fens—by pollution, and non-native vegetation.
For example, the yellow presba, a dragonfly native only to South Africa, is losing its grassland habitat to the Australian black wattle, a commercially introduced tree.
The fast-growing invasive species blocks out sunlight that sustains the grasses. The International Union for Conservation of Nature now considers this dragonfly vulnerable to extinction. All rights reserved.
Common Name: Dragonflies. Scientific Name: Anisoptera. The Aeshnids and Libellulid dragonflies are seen in the desert pool areas, such as the desert of Mojave, where they prefer living in shades, at a temperature of 18 to 45 degree Celsius. Generally, the dragonflies become limited in higher altitude areas. Hence, you will not find much species in Iceland.
These dragonflies do not inhabit such regions, but strong winds can occasionally sweep them there, like the species Hemianax Ephippiger, which is actually an inhabitant of North Africa, but is found in Iceland. The other place like Kamchatka, where the lakes and other water bodies have very low temperature, is a difficult habitat for dragonflies to survive, but still some species like Somatochlora Arctica and Aeshna Subarctica can be found in this region.
An estimate of dragonfly species had been described until These species have been classified into 11 families comprising about genera. They are mainly distributed into three super-families, the first being. This is a super-family consisting of dragonflies. The five families of this super-family are It is believed to be the most ancient species of the extant dragonflies present in this family, that also have fossils dated back to the era of the dinosaurs around million years ago.
Out of the 11 species present in the present Petaluridae Family, the largest dragonfly is the Australian Petalura Ingentissima that has a wingspan of over mm, and the length of the body is around mm. Two other species are commonly found in the United States. This family consists of five genera, namely The commonly referred hawkers or darner belongs to the Aeshnidae family, and is most widely spread in the North America. It is the largest dragonfly found in Europe and North America, and is considered as one of the largest dragonflies on the earth.
This family is also well-known for comprising the fastest flying species of dragonflies. There are numerous genera in this family, few of them are It is a big family that consists of species and 90 genera. The dragonflies are named so, due to their club-like expanding abdominal segments 7 through 9.
But this peculiarity is absent in the female Clubtail and other species in the same family. This family also consists of numerous genera; a few of them are The Austropetaliidae family of dragonflies is small and consists of only 4 genera. The dragonflies of this family are commonly seen in Australia and Chile. The genera are Cordulegastroidea is the second super-family consisting of dragonflies.
This super family consists of three families, namely:. The Cordulegastridae family of dragonflies belongs to the Anisoptera Suborder. These dragonflies have large black or brown bodies with patches of yellow shade. Their common habitat is clear, small woodland streams, where they fly about 30 cm over the water.
This small family has only four genera, namely,. The family Neopetaliidae consists of the only family member, Neopetalia Punctata dragonfly.
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