Exuviae 27 June, Belgium (1 Viewer)

[creedence]

Please can you tell me what this is? I didn’t see it emerge on the garden pond. The pond is only a few years old.

I am in the Belgian Ardennes one hour ten from the border with Luxembourg.

I have only ever seen two Zygoptera and a patrolling male Blue Hawker here.

 

[pdwinter]

It's a Hawker - the headshape from above shows that - see attached Anax / Aeshna comparison pic - and there is a small lateral spine on S6 (Anax only have lateral spines on S7-S9).

To tell which hawker it is you need to take a picture of the mask. i.e. turn the exuvia over and get an image of the underside (which is also an easier way to see the lateral spines!). See the additional 2 pics.

The ratio of mask length to width is a good indicator of species.

I suspect your exuvia is of Aeshna cyanea (Southern or Blue Hawker) but I couldn't say for sure.

I always carry a small pot around in case I bump into an exuvia because It's a lot easier to to take it indoors and get the images that show the features.

 

[creedence]

Paul thanks for your informative reply.

This is another one from this afternoon, but the same species I think. Pictures not nearly as good as yours as I use my tablet. I hope they help.

It was in the water. Racoons had been through and made a mess of the plants in the pond.

 

[pdwinter]

It certainly has a mask that's relatively long compared to its width.

Do you know which Aeshna species are in your area ?

 

[creedence]

Blue Hawker is widespread, Moorland Hawker is only six minutes drive away, but surely wouldn’t choose a garden pond, Migrant is possible, but not as common as in the UK, and Brown is not particularly common. Bog is nearly three hours drive away on the German border! So I favour Blue as it’s the only one I’ve seen here.

 

[David_]

Moorland Hawker is only six minutes drive away, but surely wouldn’t choose a garden pond

There are a lot of records of Moorland Hawkers ovipostioning in garden ponds in Germany as I learned while researching on observation.org for places to see them

 

[pdwinter]

I always try to use structural (morphological) features to identify the insect (adult / larva / exuvia) that is in front of me, rather than geographical distrubution / habitat or even behaviour, otherwise you run the risk of missing something interesting or scarce

 

[creedence]

Hi David, that is interesting and surprising!

 

[David_]

Hi David, that is interesting and surprising!

I was also surprised to see this. The “Atlas of the Dragonflies of North Rhine-Westfalia“ also mentions they are known for this