5-25 Jamestown Audubon
I had a nice morning walk at the Jamestown Audubon today. The first part of the morning I had fun looking for wildflowers with Jeff, one of their naturalists. He showed me a most beautiful Pink Ladies Slipper. After that I spent an hour looking for dragonflies. I got most of the usual ones for this time of year.
- Eastern Forktail
- Dot-tailed Whiteface
- Common Whitetail
- Widow Skimmer
- Sedge Sprite
- Slender Spreadwing
- 12-Spotted Skimmer
- Black Saddlebags
- Common Green Darner
- Fragile Forktail
The Boghaunter Hunt
I have been looking forward to sunny spring days all winter long. One of my many reasons was a smallish dragonfly called the Ebony Boghaunter (Williamsonia fletcheri). These are a rare dragonfly that are typically only seen in bogs. They are old dragonflies that are thought to be left over from a colder period before temperate forests moved north.
I invited Mon@rch to come along with me. I always enjoy have people much smarter than myself along. It save a lot of time in your field guide, and you learn all sorts of new things. As usual I was not disappointed. Tom is a wiz with birds, and had no problem blowing my mind by identifying them all with out even seeing them. He would hear a song and call out a name, then we would match a bird with its song. It always amazes me that I could walk by so many different types of birds and never know what I had missed. The warblers that we saw were so colorful. If I keep walking with Tom I might just give up the net for a pair of binoculars!
While the Allenburg Bog is a great place to hunt for dragonflies, I did not find my Boghaunter. It may have been too early in the season, or they may just not be there. It may have even been to early in the day as we left before noon. I will just have to keep looking another day. We did manage to scare up a Common Green Darner, my only ode species for the day.
A trip to the bog always gives a great wildflower show. I found my first blooming trillium and gold-thread for the year. We also saw Trout Lily and Spring Beauties. Lots of others have not started to bloom yet. I’ll leave you with a few shots.
Goldthread
