D-Day at Oare Marshes

With sunshine, light winds and some warmer temperatures forecast for this morning, I decided to make an early trip to Oare Marshes in Faversham to look for the nationally rare Dainty Damselfly. I only had until 10:30am so I arrived at the early time of 07:30 where the plan was to look through the long grasses near the breeding site to see whether any could be found. I spent the first 45 minutes only finding a couple of Variable, Azure and Blue tailed Damselfly until after the warmth started to get through, I found the first of 5 DAINTY DAMSELFLY seen today. It's still quite early in their flight season and a few 'probable' Dainties were seen emerging from the nearby pool so all being well, hopefully their numbers will build up in the next few weeks. Of the five seen today, four were female which showed the lemon yellow to the underside of the eyes and thorax, the rocket shapes on the abdomen, bar between the eyes and the pale pterostigma. Once you got your eye in, they could be picked out on size as they do appear smaller in flight, hence the name I assume. I was also able to find a mature male which along with the females, I was able to spend some time literally laying on my stomach in the wet grass taking a number of images which are probably some of my favourite of them so far. Also seen today were at least 15 teneral Scarce Emerald Damselfly in a small area and I suspect there were plenty more too. I will post some photos of them in a few days. Two Four spotted Chaser were seen on my way back to the car park. An excellent session at this lovely reserve and always a good day if you see a Dainty Damselfly. 

Dainty Damselfly (Coenagrion scitulum) - male

Showing the pale pterostigma (twice as long as wide)

Dainty Damselfly (Coenagrion scitulum) - female