Photo of the Day #651: Ebony jewelwing

Really cool! I've been seeing a fair few of a related species, the banded demoiselle (C. splendens) around ponds and streams this past month. Never noticed them until this year.

I like them! Don't see them too often, though; mostly the blue or green demoiselles or the big, sturdy dragonflies with brown spots on their wings.

I'm glad you're seeing insects. Ponds still have their dragonflies, but I've noticed an alarming lack of them this year, as though the gradual slide in the ecology has turned into a landslide. How about you?

Life is funny. A few days ago (perhaps the very day you were posting this picture) I was walking in the streets of a small town, when I came across one of those. It fluttered around (perhaps looking for the way back to the next pond) and sometimes glided. I thought it was the first time I saw a black dragonfly (not quite black, sure, but almost).

Monado; I only am really around ponds when I go on hikes every few weeks, but I have seen a lot of damselflies and dragonflies in different locations. I saw them more in the early part of the summer (late June/early July) than now, but the place where I took this photo, in particular, had a lot of them, both around the pond and in the forest.