[ggregory71]

Dear Sean and other Odonata enthusiasts,
Attached are some of Pekka Fagel's photographs of Kuwait Odonata. He called them something like Oasis Blue-tailed Skimmer and Dark-winged Groundling (?). Please confirm the identifications.

[HarassedDad]

The dragonfly is a male Brachythemis fuscopalliata (I don't know of a common name but dark-winged groundling sounds likely by analogy with american names for other Brachythemis)
http://www.arkive.org/species/GES/in...ml?size=medium

The damselfly, to be honest, looks exactly like Ischnura elegans (which in the uk would be the blue-tailed damselfly, and in europe the common bluetail). I see that Kuwait hosts a sub-species (Ischnura elegans ebneri Schmidt, 1938 ) and also Ischnura fountainei - but I can't find any on-line resources or links to descriptions or pictures of those.
I feel confident that it's Ischnura - the bicoloured pterostigma is pretty unique to the genus - but I'm no expert on middle eastern odonata.

[jtibbetts]

Looking in my Odonates of europe book, the damselfly appears to be [i]Ischnura[i] fountainei due to the orange colouration to the underside of segments 3-6 and the sky-blue colouration of the upperparts with no green hint.
Excellent book this is: Field Guide to the Dragonflies and Damselflies of Britain and Europe by Klaas-Douwe B Dijikstra. Illustrated by Richard Lewington.

[Ghostly Vision]

Hi there,

We recently visited Kuwait and saw the species of Bluetail that Pekka photographed. In the field, it was identified as Oasis bluetail. Pekka does have the Dijkstra/Lewington book now, and wanted confirmation of his id's.

The groundling is pretty distinctive and should cause no problem.

Regards

Sean

[HarassedDad]

Dijkstra does indeed give Ischnura fountaineae the common name Oasis Bluetail (Note the correct spelling of the scientific name this time - that'll teach me to rely on the web.)