Shiny emerald dragonfly
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Shiny emerald dragonfly ( Somatochlora metallica ) |
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| Somatochlora metallica | ||||||||||||
| ( Vander Linden , 1825) |
The shiny emerald dragonfly ( Somatochlora metallica ) is a species of the falcon dragonfly family . The ore-green iridescent body and the emerald-green eyes are striking.
features
This dragonfly becomes up to six centimeters long and reaches a wingspan of seven centimeters. The thorax and abdomen are shiny metallic-green in color, in old animals also golden-green to copper. The forehead in front of the eyes has a yellow cross band. The males are waisted; its abdomen is then widest at the level of the fifth and sixth segments. The females have a remarkably long (up to 3 mm) laying sheath that protrudes vertically downwards. The very similar falcon dragonfly (also: common emerald dragonfly; Cordulia aenea ) differs, among other things, in a more club-shaped thickened abdomen (males; widest on the 7th and 8th segment) or a cylindrical abdomen without a conspicuous laying tube (females) and looks somewhat more hairy.
distribution
The shiny emerald dragonfly is a Euro-Siberian element of fauna; northward their area extends to the subarctic tree line (in Norway and Finland up to 70 ° 25 'north latitude, in Siberia up to 69 ° 40' north latitude). To the east it extends to Tomsk in Siberia, west to Lorraine in France (beyond that only sporadically; this also applies to Great Britain). In southern France, northern and central Italy, on the Balkan Peninsula and in Asia Minor, the subspecies Somatochlora metallica meridionalis occurs, but is often regarded as a separate species of Balkan emerald dragonfly ( Somatochlora meridionalis ). The shiny emerald dragonfly is widespread in Central, Northern and Eastern Europe and is common in the region. In Germany it is somewhat rarer than the falcon dragonfly ( Cordulia aenea ), but in northern Germany it is the other way around.
Habitat and way of life
The shiny emerald dragonfly lives in particular in stagnant bodies of water of medium size, for example ponds with wooded banks, and often also dystrophic bog waters. Slowly flowing ditches and brooks are also populated.
The flight time in Central Europe sometimes starts at the end of May, but does not peak until July and August and ends in September. Individual animals rarely grow older than two months as imago . The males hardly ever rest, mostly they fly patrolling along the waterfront. They are looking for females and driving competing males out of their territory. Females hide in the reed beds. When laying eggs, they adopt a conspicuous posture by bending the two rearmost abdominal segments upwards at right angles. Then the abdomen with the laying tube is dipped into the water in a shaking flight with rocking movements, whereby the eggs are stripped off.
The eggs develop into larvae after four to six weeks. These are a little stronger than Cordulia aenea and have curved dorsal spines. They spend two to three years in the water before they undergo the metamorphosis into an imago .
literature
- Heiko Bellmann: The cosmos dragonfly guide. Franckh-Kosmos, Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 978-3-440-10616-7
- Helgard Reichholf-Riehm: Insects. Mosaik-Verlag, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-572-01088-8
- Klaus Sternberg, Bertrand Schmidt: Somatochlora metallica (Vander Linden, 1825), shiny emerald dragonfly. Pp. 275–284 in: Sternberg / Buchwald (ed.): Die Libellen Baden-Württemberg , Volume 2, Ulmer Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-8001-3514-0
Web links
- Taxonomy in Fauna Europaea (Engl.)
- Somatochlora metallica inthe IUCN 2013 Red List of Threatened Species . Posted by: Clausnitzer, V., 2007. Retrieved September 24, 2013.