Dragonflies
About the DVD
The Dragonfly DVD starts with an Introduction offering tips on how to use it updated from the Damselflies volume. It continues with a short description of the Dainty Damselfly found breeding again in Britain after the Damselfly DVD had been released. Descriptions of the Dragonflies follow.
A short film on each species is divided into four parts, in the same style as the companion DVD including:
- an introduction to the species
- male identification
- female identification
- breeding behaviour.
Habitat views are included along with graphics showing distribution and flight seasons. Similar dragonfly species are compared. In addition, all the species in some family groups (eg. Chasers and Skimmers) are compared side by side.
The running time for the Introduction is approximately 6 minutes and the running time for the Dragonfly Species Films is approximately 160 minutes (2 hours 40 minutes). If you need a longer look at a specific view hit the ‘pause’ button. ALL but one of the 26 resident breeding or regular migrant British species are described plus some of the vagrants and one extinct species. Since publishing the DVDs the Vagrant Emperor has become a regular visitor with attempts at breeding.
Together with the Damselflies DVD, nearly ALL the resident and regular migrant species of dragonflies and damselflies are covered along with most of the more frequent vagrants and some potential visitors. With only about 60 species in total, learning their IDs is a far less daunting task than it is with the hundreds of bird species to be seen.
Graham Sherwin gswildlife.co.uk
Please take a look at some short examples from the DVD. This was filmed in SD quality at 4:3 ratio. Whilst the distribution information might be out of date, details for identification, life cycle, behaviour and habitats are all relevant.
Since publishing the Damselfy and Dragonfly DVDs, the Southern Migrant Hawker has been breeding around the Thames estuary and seems to be spreading further north and west. Yellow-legged Clubtail, Yellow-spotted Emerald and Large White-faced Darter have been added to the vagrants list.
This male Vagrant Emperor was photographed at Carlton Marshes in 2019. They have been seen almost annually in recent years and could turn up almost anywhere at almost any time of the year.
