By contrast we've not had a single Red-veined Darter sighting yet this year which seems to reflect a rather poor showing nationally. Saw some figures yesterday which showed numbers in the Netherlands low in comparison to the bumper numbers last year.
As we also had a record year last year I would have expected more home grown specimens, especially during the perfect conditions we had in May. Recent weather too should have been conducive to further immigration but only small numbers noted, mainly in Cornwall.
That's really interesting about RVDs being so scarce this year. Until last year I had never recorded them at my patch in NW Yorks, which is about 5 miles south of Scotch Corner (less than 10 miles to the Durham border). There had been a few previous records from nearby sites in Yorks, mainly from the 2006 irruption, and they have also bred at various sites in Yorks-mainly along the coast and most notably at Spurn.
Last year I saw 5 individuals in July (4 males and a mature female) but saw no evidence of breeding behaviour.
Fast forward to this year, and I counted at least 7 (4-5m/2 fem) at one site and at least 2-3 at another nearby site on 25th June. Breeding behaviour was noted at the site where I saw them last year, and my assumption was that these were likely to have been the results of breeding last year (but of course I saw no proof of this). The weather changed subsequently and hence, I haven't seen any others since.
The local dragonfly recorder came to look and suggested that as all individuals seen this year were mature adults, they could conceivably have arrived as a 'flock' from further south (abroad even) and weren't necessarily bred on site.
Of course both scenarios are just theories, but given your experiences and those of others in NW Europe, it's a little mysterious where they actually came from?
Also of note, I recorded the first Small Red-eyed Damselflies in NW Yorks last summer-but just a handful at each of 3 sites. The previous nearest records before last year were in the York area (40 miles away), and from the coast near Scarborough. It's now common knowledge that they reached as far north as Tyne and Wear last summer, and perhaps even further north? just to put my local ones into context.
Again, fast forward to this year, and no records until last week. I checked a new site near home and found what I thought were 40-50 individuals in fairly overcast, but warm conditions. I returned 2 days later, again with the local recorder who wanted to witness such great counts for this species in the county.
However, the weather was much hotter and we actually estimated around 500 individuals present!
I'm told that SR-eD have a 2 year life cycle, so it makes me wonder had they been present in the area since much longer than last year?
We live in interesting times. Where I previously only expected to see a handful of common species each summer, the possibilities have suddenly opened up dramatically...
What will we see next?