Calico Pennant

I know some people who love to chase butterflies but are freaked out when it comes to dragonflies. When I ask them about it I usually get an answer something like dragonflies are bugs. Then I explain that both dragonflies and butterflies are insects. But butterflies are pretty they usually tell me and so I ask them if they have ever seen a calico pennant. On the pretty scale calico pennants are a match for any butterfly. The male, seen above, is mostly red with red spots that look like hearts running up the abdomen. The female and young have mostly the same pattern except they are bright yellow instead of red.

Belated Valentine

Like a stereotypical guy I am late for Valentines Day this year. I meant to post this last Wednesday but got rapped up in life and it slipped my mind. The calico pennant is one of the most colorful and attractive dragonflies that you can find in North America. In my opinion it rivals any of the butterfly species around and the distinctive red heart shaped spots on the abdomen of the male make it a great subject for Valentines Day, or in my case a belated Valentines Day.

Calico Pennant

The calico pennant is one of the brightest and easily distinguishable dragonflies in this area. Mature males are red and black with the signature heart shape spots running down the abdomen, above. Females and immature males are yellow and black with the top spots more of a triangle shape then a heart shape, below. They are found through out much of eastern and central North America. Like most skippers they are usually found around slow moving water such as ponds and marshes. They often perch horizontally off of a branch or blade of grass making them appear like a flag or pennant bowing in the wind. Males are not territorial and often perch on the shore of a pond waiting for females.

Happy Valentine's Day

Typically Michelle and I do not celebrate Valentine's Day. It has become another big day for people to sell you junk, like flowers, candy, PJs, berries, jewelry or whatever, but it is meaningless if the reason that you are doing it is just because it is Valentine's Day.

This year I decided to break with tradition and I got Michelle a gift. I can't tell you what it is, you never know if she might be reading this, but it is something special and fun. It is not something that has to do with the commercialism of Valentine's Day and since there is no expectation of a gift she will know that I got it for her to make her happy and not because Hallmark told me I had to.

By the way it is not the calico pennant pictured above. Dragonflies are not on Michelle's list of favorite things.

Calico Penant

I thought that this would be a very fitting picture for MM this week considering that today is Valentines Day. I remember when I first started to photograph dragons I was looking on some website and I saw a picture of the calico pennant and thought that it had to be one of the coolest dragonfly around. I photographed my first calico back in 2008 in the Sax Zim Bog area. I was so excited I almost did not get the shot. I took this picture at a dragonfly seminar held by the Minnesota Odonata Survey Project at Camp Ripley. I have not yet had the privilege of spotting one of the females who are yellow in color. Maybe this year I will add one to my photo collection.

Really Cool Dragons at the Sax Zim Bog

When we left the Vince Shute Wildlife Sanctuary it was late we so we decided to stay the night at a hotel in the small town of Orr, MN. We got up early on the sixth and headed out right away. We did not have anything going that day, besides the 3 plus hour drive home, but since we were in the area I wanted to make a quick side trip and drive through the Sax Zim Bog area. The Sax Zim Bog is vast conifer bog located in north east Minnesota. The approximately 200 square mile area consists of a mix of spruce, tamarack, and northern white cedar bogs as well as hay fields and sedge meadows. It also includes 3 separate wildlife management areas.

The Sax Zim Bog is known as one of the best places, in the US, to see northern migrant bird species during the winter. Some of the species that you might see if you visit during the frigid months are northern goshawk, great grey owls, snowy owls, northern hawk owls, boreal owls, three-toed woodpeckers, black-backed woodpeckers, evening and pine grosbeak, common and hoary redpoll, crossbills, gray jays, bohemian waxwing, boreal chickadee and more.

We discovered that Sax Zim Bog is also a great place to photograph wildlife in the summer. Although we did not spend as much time as I would have liked exploring the different bog habitat, we still had a long drive home, we did find a lot to look at and photograph in the short time that we were there. Since it was July the dragonflies and damselflies where in high season and there were many around to photograph.
As I learned in the dragonfly workshop, which I took in August, it is difficult to tell the difference between damselflies with out capturing them and investigating them under a magnifying glass. My guess at the damsel above would be a familiar bluet but it is tough to be 100% positive with just a photo.
The chalk-fronted corporal, named for the pair of white stripes on the front of the thorax which resemble corporal stripes, are always a good thing to see. They are very social and often gather together in groups to feast on nasty pests like mosquitoes and deer flies.
There are also several types of meadowhawks that are very difficult to distinguish between. If you have captured a male, which in most cases are red in color, and are looking at it under a magnifying lens there are differences that you can see. However the females, which are a yellow color like the one above, are almost impossible to tell.
At first I believed that this was another female meadowhawk, but on closer examination of the photo I realized that it is actually a female dot-tailed whiteface. These were the first type of dragons that I spotted in the spring after the green darners. The males are black, with a single yellow dot on segment 7 of the abdomen and a white face.
The most exciting find of the day, and for me the most exciting of the trip, was a calico pennant. When I started photographing dragonflies last summer I visited several websites to help me identify the dragons that I had shot and get some info. At that point I spotted a picture of a calico pennant and thought that it was one of the coolest dragonflies that I had seen. From then on I had always hoped that I would see one and that Sunday was the day.
We had stopped to take a look at a shorebird that was perched on a rock in the midst of a small pool. The bird was pretty far away so I was easily distracted by some butterflies and dragonflies in the grass on the side of the road. I was on my way back to the car when I spotted a large dragon landing nearby. I went over to take a look and I was stunned to see this male calico in the grass. Before I could get a picture it took off and my heart stopped. Fortunately it did not go far, it landed and I was able to get several nice shots. Though they are not listed as a rare species in Northern Minnesota not many people that I know have seen them. In fact the leaders of the dragonfly workshop that I went to in August have been hunting dragons for about 10 years and they still have not seen a calico in Minnesota. So I was really excited to add it to my dragon collection and I am planning to use the first calico pic above as the February photo for my 2009 calendar.