Scarce Success at Sandwich Bay

As mentioned in my post a few days earlier, I spent a few hours at Sandwich Bay at the weekend where I spent a while looking for a female form aurantiaca scarce Blue tailed Damselfly had had been seen a few days earlier. Despite searching and searching, I could not find it but in looking for it, I did manage to find 3 Scarce Blue tailed Damselfly which included 1 mature male and 2 teneral males. This species was only seen for the first time last year in Kent so to have some successfully emerging is fantastic news. I just hope that they have a good season and enough females can egg lay to keep this species slowly securing their status in Kent. I spent some time watching and photographing a mature male and as my experience is very limited with this species, It was certainly very helpful to work my way through the markings and identification features needed. As I was photographing this male, a teneral damselfly fluttered over my shoulder and landed nearby. I took a few initial shots and was surprised that it was a teneral male Scarce Blue tailed Damselfly. Although just emerged and colourless, I could make out the markings at the end of the abdomen and set about taking a number of photos. After this was done, I looked at the area where the damselfly flew over me and checked the waters edge where I found 3 damselfly exuviae, which I collected. One looks larger than the other, one has no caudal lamellae and one looks in good condition, and a brief look at this one looks quite good for Scarce Blue tailed Damselfly. I will have try and clean it and take a few photos to put on here for others to have a look at. You never know, it just might be. With plenty of photos taken and a superb session at this excellent site, I made my way back to the car. I will certainly be back in a few weeks.

Scarce Blue tailed Damselfly - male

Scarce Blue tailed Damselfly - teneral male