Orange Featherleg
(Platycnemis acutipennis)

Unlike its common and widespread stablemate Platycnemis pennipes, the Orange Featherleg has a very limited distribution, occurring only in parts of France and Iberia, where it lives in reasonably fast-flowing rivers and streams. The male Platycnemis acutipennis must surely rank among Europe's prettiest damselflies, with its orange abdomen and light-blue eyes. The female too has a (pale) orange abdomen but her eyes are greyish. Size-wise P. acutipennis is maybe a touch daintier than pennipes. We made our photographs of this species during a field trip to the Ardèche in the South of France and then, later, in the South of Spain.

For an overview of the Orange Featherleg's distribution in Europe, hover your mouse pointer over the map symbol .
With the authors' permission we have based this map on data published in Kalkman et al. (2010).
Legend: Red = Occurs, White = Doesn't occur; Purple = Extinct; Yellow = Vagrant.

Hover your mouse pointer over a thumbnail below to display a larger version of it. Or click on a thumbnail to display the photograph (at 1050 x 700 pixels) in a new window. And then, if you'd like to get even closer, you can drag the ZoomBox from the top-left corner of that window across the photograph. Note that you may have to refresh the window manually (by pressing F5 on your keyboard) for the ZoomBox to display correctly.