Common Green Darner – Page 2

A Lake Darner in Ottawa

On August 27th, the last Saturday of the month, I headed out to a spot I normally don’t visit so late in the summer – Roger’s Pond along the Cedar Grove Nature Trail. I usually go in May and June when early-season dragonflies are flying, such as the locally rare Ebony Boghaunter, the uncommon Harlequin Darner and Brush-tipped Emerald, as well as the usual whitefaces, Racket-tailed Emeralds, Spiny and Beaverpond Baskettails, and Aurora Damsels. I had two reasons for wanting to go: the first was the Band-winged Meadowhawk, a species I had seen in good numbers here on one late-summer visit several years ago but have had trouble finding recently, and the second was a yearning to find some Aeshna darners. After seeing such a good variety at my Dad’s trailer and failing to find the Variable Darner at Bruce Pit, I thought that Roger’s Pond might be a good spot to look for Ottawa’s common and uncommon species.

To Catch a Wandering Glider

I had a fabulous outing in Stony Swamp this morning. I started the morning by birding at Sarsaparilla Trail where I found a pair of Pied-billed Grebes and a Merlin perched in one of the dead trees at the north end of the pond; it was so far off that I had to return to the car and get my scope to identify it. I was glad I had brought my scope, for as I was scanning the vegetation along the shoreline I discovered two heron species skulking at the edge of the pond: a tiny Green Heron poised on a log, and an American Bittern that was almost invisible in a gap in the reeds! It made me wonder what other birds were present, going about their lives while remaining hidden from view.

Mid-summer

It’s hard to believe that it’s mid-summer now; July is over, August is here, and songbird migration is only a few weeks away. When it comes to insects, I’m not thinking as much about seeing the first species of the season as I am wondering whether each individual (except for the darners and meadowhawks) is my last of the season. There are some species I seem to have missed completely this year, such as Emerald Spreadwing (which has a flight season from mid-June to mid-August), Horned Clubtail (mid-May to early July), Stream Cruiser (late May to mid-July), and any of the hairstreak butterflies (the peak of their flight season occurs in the first half of July). This is the result of a combination of bad luck and bad weather; I missed most of these bugs when I went looking in places where I have seen them before, and when I wanted to return later, the cold, overcast and/or rainy weather on the weekends prevented me.