Liten torvlibelle
(Leucorrhinia dubia)

Being based in Italy has certain advantages (quite apart from the weather, wine and food): with 87 recorded species, the country's one of Europe's richest hunting grounds for odonatologists. But certain genera are remarkably underrepresented here, and one such genus is Leucorrhinia. Our photographs of the commonest species of the genus, the Small Whiteface, were all made in Germany and the Netherlands, and we're hoping to find many of its congeners on our travels North in 2008. Leucorrhinia dubia is a small dragonfly of Central and Northern Europe. Its main distinguishing features include the white 'snout' which give the genus its scientific and common names, the red spots on the male's thorax and on abdominal segments 1-7 (in females and immature males, these spots are yellow), and - specifically - the colour of the costa (i.e. the leading edge on the front wing): from the base to the half-way node, the costa is black; from the node to the wing tip, it's yellow.

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