King of the Nymphs!

Earlier this week after work I made a visit to a local pond to release some of the larvae I had caught and photographed earlier from my tank sessions. It seems right that after photographing them that I release them to go about their natural lives as best they can. After doing this I had about 15 minutes of pond dipping to see what I could get. I caught a few Common Blue Damselfly which I have yet to photograph but near the end of the session I caught what I have been after for some while, a near fully grown Emperor Dragonfly nymph of about 55mm in length, a beast of a nymph in size and looks. I returned home with it and that evening set about trying to get a few photos of it. Unlike the rest of the nymphs I have photographed where I can get quite close with the camera, for this one because of its size, I had to stand quite a bit back to get it all in the viewfinder. This presented a few issues with shadows etc but I ended up with a few nice images although I'm sure I will be able to get better when I have thought about a plan to capture this in a better way. It was nice to get a few close images of the nymph and a chance to study this species in all its detail from close range. I will hopefully rear this one to its release and would love to capture it emerging. What I do know is that anything else in the tank is doing its best to hide from this stunning nymph. I'm sure another session with this nymph will take place in the next few days with hopefully a few more images to share!

Emperor Dragonfly Nymph (55mm Long)