Southern rush damsel
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Southern rush damsel ( Lestes barbarus ), female |
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| Read barbarus | ||||||||||||
| ( Fabricius , 1798) |
The southern rush damsel ( Lestes barbarus ) is a small dragonfly from the genus of the rush damsel ( Lestes ). It belongs to the family of the pond damsel (Lestidae) and is a Mediterranean element of fauna.
description
The species reaches a wingspan of 4.5 to 5 centimeters. The body of Imagines is dark metallic-brown; also greenish in hatching specimens that are not yet colored. As with many dragonflies, the wings are glassy and transparent; The two-colored wing marks, whitish on the outside and brown on the inside, can serve as a species-specific identification mark.
One can confuse this species with the other rush girls; the pterostigma is a clear distinguishing feature.
Occurrence and habitat
The animals live on stagnant water banks with a lot of vegetation and swampy, overgrown small bodies of water, which are mainly dominated by rushes . In southern Europe they also colonize brackish waters near the coast. The southern rush damsel flies from June to September and is endangered in Central Europe, where it occurs as a sporadic migratory species. It is mainly widespread in southern Europe.
Reproduction and way of life
The pairing takes about half an hour. The male accompanies the female to lay eggs, which takes place on plants protruding from the water, but unlike the other rush dams, the female then lays the eggs alone. The eggs overwinter and the aquatic development from larva to dragonfly only takes two to three months.
Small insects that are captured in flight serve as food for the adults.
literature
- Gerhard Jurzitza: The Kosmos dragonfly guide . Franckh-Kosmos Verlag, Stuttgart 2000, ISBN 3-440-08402-7 .
- Reinhard Jödicke: The rush maids and winter dragonflies of Europe. Westarp Sciences, Magdeburg 1997, ISBN 3-89432-460-0 .
Web links
- Photos of the southern rush damsel
- Lestes barbarus inthe IUCN 2013 Red List of Threatened Species . Posted by: Clausnitzer, V., 2007. Retrieved February 18, 2014.