Lesser Emperor at Stanwick Lakes

This year has been a good one for migrants, with an invasion of Southern Migrant Hawkers and a Yellow-spotted Emerald seen in Suffolk. I haven't heard of too many Red-veined Darters though, but plenty of Lesser Emperors have been recorded across the UK. 

To date, Northants has largely escaped these invaders, until that is, Doug Goddard reported a male Lesser Emperor at Stanwick Lakes (see Doug's photo below) on 3 August. Naturally, this prompted some excitement and, separately, around 8 of us went down to the Lakes today (4th) hoping he would show again - guess what, nothing. In fact there were so few dragonflies about , perhpos due to the recent heatwave. We did see a few Migrants, Brown Hawkers, Emperors, Common & Ruddy Darters, Brown Hawkers, Banded Demoiselles, Common Blue and Red-eyed Damselflies but in relatively small numbers. There were plenty of blue-form female Common Blues that seem more common at this time in the season.

So, although the Lesser Emperor didn't show, he (or others) may well turn up at other sites along the Nene valley.

Lesser Emperor at Stanwick Lakes (photo by Doug Goddard)

Mating Common Blue Damselflies, female of the blue colour form

Female Emperor

Mating Common Blue Damselflies, female of the blue colour form