outdoorswithcamera

I intend these photos as a “study”— an exercise producing a series of sketches, but in this case photographic sketches. Most of my photos reflect a great gift of tolerance, if not quite trust, on the part of the photographic object. I came across these conjoined dragonflies in the corn fields that make up one part of the Nine Springs E-Way—one of the many Dane County Parks, this one straddling Madison and Fitchburg Wisconsin.

If my identification is correct the dragonfly species they represent is “shadow darners” or Aeshna umbrosa (in the family Aeshnidae), about which there is a good article in Wikipedia.

You will find another photo of the shadow darners mating in the SmugMug folder containing shots of our recent trip to the Midwest.