A Stunning Sunrise Captured

With clear skies forecast and light winds for this morning I was out of the house at 5.30am to hopefully catch some early morning dragonfly action. I arrived a few minutes later and as I walked up the entrance track I was amazed at the colour of the sky against the plants and trees. It was a lovely orange/red colour and this gave me an idea for a few photos. I had about 15 minutes until sunrise and decided to find a damselfly that would have a bright sunlit background to it and show a silhouette. It was easy to find plenty of blades of grass for the shot but finding a damselfly on one was a bit more challenging. Eventually I found a few at rest and laying down and composing the shot, I actually thought this might work. I set up the tripod and got everything into position and waited. Not long after the sky began to show a brighter orange colour and the sun started to rise. I had to work quite quickly and move into various positions to get a few shots but with a bit of luck I managed a few shots that I must say, I am very pleased with. The way the sun catches the damselfly is just stunning and its like the Common Blue Damselfly is watching the day begin.

Common Blue Damselfly at Dawn

With the sun moving higher in the sky I moved on to see what was around. I only spent a while longer walking around and noted plenty of Common Blue and Blue tailed Damselfly with a few Emerald Damselfly seen too and at 8am it was off home for breakfast. With the family going to the beach at 11am I had a few more hours back out and decided to have a look over at Reculver. I spent a pleasant hour there where I saw a few Migrant Hawker as well as Common Blue and Blue tailed Damselflies and both Common and Ruddy Darter. I decided to return to the site south of Reculver where it was now quite warm and there was a lot of dragonfly activity about. One of today's highlights was when I was walking down the entrance track and a large damselfly flew out from a bush and returned to land again. I put the binoculars on to it and could see it was a male Willow Emerald Damselfly, my first at this site and probably the first record for the site. I watched it for a while and checked for others but couldn't see any, no doubt there are others around I'm sure. Walking down and around the water I saw c8 Emperor Dragonfly, c6 Migrant Hawker including a female egg laying where I had watched one emerge earlier in the month, 1 Four spotted Chaser, c4 Black tailed Skimmer, lots of Common Darter with lesser numbers of Ruddy Darter, good numbers of Common Blue and Blue tailed Damselfly with the odd Emerald Damselfly seen as well. For the last 10 minutes I put the camera away, sat on some high ground looking over the area and just watched the dragonflies and damselflies flying around. A very nice session in lovely sunny weather with little wind, lots to look at and photograph and nice to get a Willow Emerald Damselfly there, but the undoubted highlight has to be that early morning sunrise with the damselflies in silhouette, just brilliant and a privilege to be able to watch and capture some of my best photos I have probably ever taken.

Common Blue Damselfly at Dawn