David Element's Wildlife Web Page Dragonflies and Damselflies 25

David Element

Wildlife Photography and Digital Video Images

_____________________________________________________Dragonflies and Damselflies 25 - Scarlet Darters

SCARLET DARTER Crocothemis erythraea (m)

SCARLET DARTER Crocothemis erythraea (f)

The Scarlet Darter Dragonfly (or Broad Scarlet) Crocothemis erythraea is a strikingly coloured European dragonfly originating from Africa that has recently been recorded as an occasional visitor to the UK. If the British climate continues to warm up this species is a candidate for possible future colonisation as it just needs to ‘hop’ over the English Channel. These photographs were taken in southern France. The dragonflies are generally very active in warm weather and quite difficult to approach. The females shown in the last two photographs are much more subdued in colour than their fully adult male counterparts and therefore harder to find. There is a characteristic whitish stripe on the thorax. The legs are orange without any black markings and this feature and the broad abdomen should enable observers to identify this species relatively easily when making a comparison with the other predominantly red darter dragonflies.

Short films of Scarlet Darter Dragonflies may be seen at: https://youtu.be/7EaaHIpP1mo and https://youtu.be/4NoUQbgN3E0.