Hatching Dragons

Yesterday, I spent my time outdoors in two failed photo-journal pursuits. The first was tracking down a black capped chickadee nest I was watching. To my dismay, the nest was ransacked by some unknown predator (probably a raccoon) with nothing to show but stray feathers and egg shells. The second was to catch a freshly hatched painted turtle. A nest hatched and they quickly dropped into the stagnant, green waters of a deep roadside culvert - just out of reach. I sidled down the banking and realized with just one step in the water, I could reach one. So I took off a shoe, rolled up a pant leg, took a step down into the gross water and tried very slowly and carefully to ... and fell in! Nasty! AND I didn't get a turtle either. That was the worst part! So just when I was about to write off my day as *insert raspberry sound here*, I came across a seldom seen transformation; the hatching of dragonflies.That picture looks even nicer expanded. Click on it to see! There are so many different species of dragonflies and darners in NH, that I don't even know how to begin identifying this one without a good guide (the web is seriously lacking in good identification keys).

I walked along the grassy area by the Wildlife Pond at Beaver Brook where crickets and snakes can usually be found. Instead, I found lots of discarded, creepy shells of "dragonfly excuvae." These are the empty skins of dragons before they become flies. Don't expand the picture to the left if you don't like insects. It's rather "ew"-worthy.

Like butterflies from cocoons, dragonflies emerge from these skins complete with beautiful patterns and wings. The excuvai is normally insanely tiny compared to the dragonfly that emerges. The crumpled wings that were inside the skin are supple and crumpled. Here's a dragon that just emerged.


From this point, they try to sit stationary in the sun to dry off and let their wings harden enough to allow them flight. Just walking through the grass, I had many climb up onto me. It was very windy, so they were having a tough time of it. I sat with this one in particular, protecting it from the wind, just to see it all the way from excuvae to flight. It took a while, but it was pretty wonderful to experience. A half hour after the picture to the right, the picture below
shows the dragon's progress.


And the picture at the very top was the final snap I got before s/he took off into the air. I think it was a thank you shot. ;)