Diary 2008

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Sun 2 The Common Winter Damsels (Sympecma fusca) were already out in force today. At the lake at Colle Malamerenda we saw at least 50 of them, mostly single males and tandems with ovipositing females. One such tandem has now made it onto the Sympecma fusca species page and can be seen here. We didn't see any other species on the wing yet, but the Common Bluetail (Ischnura elegans) should be arriving on the scene soon if the spring-like weather we had today keeps up.
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Thu 13 March clearly got off to a false start. After the spring-like weather two weeks ago, cold and windy weather set in and kept us indoors for almost two weeks. But today it was a warm and sunny day again, and so we went back to the lake at Colle. As expected, the Common Winter Damsels (Sympecma fusca) were out in force again and at 11 o'clock we saw lots of frantic activity. In the end we managed to make one photograph of a male which improves on one of our current top 20. We'll add it to the species page shortly. The only other thing of note today was a trio of swallows which graced the skies over the lake. Nothing unusual about that, maybe, but they have arrived remarkably early this year; exactly two weeks earlier than in 2006 and three weeks earlier than last year. Hopefully they will have brought warm and steady weather with them (or else a warm jumper and a brolly).
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Sun 30 The weather's finally been changing for the better and so today we could venture out again, after what seemed like an eternity. There was nothing yet on the wing at some of the streams we checked (running water presumably remains cold for much longer than shallow, stagnant water), but with a nice spell of warm weather ahead of us we're hoping to see our first Large Red Damsel (Pyrrhosoma nymphula) of the year pretty soon. In the meantime our best bet remains the lake at Colle Malamerenda and there we saw the usual swarm of Common Winter Damsels (Sympecma fusca), of course, but also the first Common Bluetails (Ischnura elegans) of 2008. Most of the dozen or so we saw were still very immature with washed-out colours and wet wings. But some males we already taking on their adult colours. One of them is now at #8 on the Ischnura elegans species page and can be seen here. Incidentally, the date of 30 March is an improvement by three days on our earliest date so far for photographing Ischnura elegans.
Mon 31 

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Tue 29  To celebrate the first rainy day in a good while we decided today to update our website, choose a new Photo of the Month, etc. As an observant visitor, you will have noticed that we haven't updated our Diary 2008 very regularly. And that has been a conscious decision on our part in order to reduce our administrative overhead. Our plan for this year is to continue to report, through this page, on our field trips abroad or to particularly interesting local areas but not on our day-to-day, local field trips. But we will of course continue to add new and better photographs to our site as we make them. To summarise the month of April to date: we've had pretty decent weather (especially in the past couple of weeks) but overall spring has been a bit chilly and rainy. Having said that, the dates at which most species have started flying have been more or less in line with expectations, and we've already seen and photographed 16 species in 2008 (for the record they are: Calopteryx splendens, Calopteryx virgo, Coenagrion caerulescens, Coenagrion mercuriale, Coenagrion puella, Coenagrion pulchellum, Gomphus vulgatissimus, Ischnura elegans, Ischnura pumilio, Libellula depressa, Libellula fulva, Libellula quadrimaculata, Orthetrum cancellatum, Platycnemis pennipes, Pyrrhosoma nymphula and of course Sympecma fusca). For photographs of some of the above species, please refer to the What's New page or to the relevant species pages.
Wed 30 

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Fri 2 K had told us about a site near Rosenheim (Germany) which holds good numbers of the rare Siberian Winter Damsel (Sympecma paedisca), so this morning we decided to go and see for ourselves. We asked the helpful owner for permission to walk in the grounds and photograph some damselflies (apparently not such an usual request, given her reaction). The day started off reasonably sunny but a bit on the chilly side and later on we were treated regularly to short, sharp showers. As a result the light today was rather poor and we had to use high ISO settings pretty much all the time. In between those showers, though, we did manage to see and photograph plenty of Siberian Winter Damsels, checking each individual carefully to make sure we weren't 'wasting' our time on Common Winter Damsels. So with this new species (finally! - our previous addition dated back to September 2007) our total has now gone up to 75. Only 53 to go.
Sat 3 Today we went back to the same site hoping to see and photograph more females and possibly even some tandems or copulas. With yesterday's chill the females had apparently decided to stay away from the water and as a result we'd photographed almost exclusively males. But today was much brighter and sunnier, the females decided to come down to the water, and so we did manage to photograph quite a few of them. And by way of a bonus, we even managed to sneak up on a copulating pair. For the results of our efforts please refer to the Sympecma paedisca species page (or click on What's New). In summary, we were delighted to find those Siberian Winter Damsels, we're reasonably happy with our photographs of them, and now can't wait to find the next new species.
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