Out and About in East Kent

After spending last weekend in the company of Paul and Sue Ritchie, it was my turn to entertain this morning and hopefully show them some Kent Norfolk Hawkers at Westbere. I had planned to meet them at 10.30am in Westbere so before this, I made a visit inland of Reculver where I spent an hour or so looking around. The sun was out but there was a strong breeze keeping a lot of the dragonflies down. I managed to see 1 Red veined Darter, 5 Black tailed Skimmer, 1 Four spotted Chaser, c10 Common Darter, 1 Ruddy Darter and c30 Emerald Damselflies which provided the entertainment with the camera.

Male Emerald Damselfly 

Immature Female Emerald Damselfly

Male Emerald Damselfly  

Male Emerald Damselfly 

Ruddy Darter

Common Darter

As the time moved on I drove down to Westbere where not long later Paul and Sue arrived and we made our way to the Hawker site. The sun was now warming up nicely and on arrival we met Martyn Wilson and Sue Morton who had the same idea. A brief look around and soon Paul and Sue were looking at their first Kent Norfolk Hawkers and the cameras soon began firing off. We spent some time in this area noting c4 Norfolk Hawker before we moved off and had a walk. Walking west towards Fordwich we saw c3 Brown Hawker, lots of Banded Demoiselles everywhere, Blue tailed Damselfly, a few Variable Damselfly and 1 Norfolk Hawker in an area that was new to me. After a chat we said our goodbyes and I left Paul and Sue to continue to wander around the area and walking back I saw 3 Scarce Chaser to add to the list.

Male Scarce Chaser

 Later this afternoon I spent 30 mins south of Reculver where I wanted to look again for Red veined Darters. Unfortunately there were a few big dogs and people in the area so I couldn't look in the area wanted but a quick look nearby produced 1 Red veined Darter which didn't hang around and 2 Emperor Dragonfly. Not a bad few hours and a good number of species seen in pleasant sunshine. 

Mating Blue tailed Damselflies