Dragonfly General Facts Some Common Species Footnotes

The life cycle of the dragonfly, from egg to death of adult, is from six months to as much as six or seven years. Sometimes female dragonflies lay eggs in the small cleft between mud or moss. Most of their life time is spent in the larval (nymph) form, beneath the water surface, using gills to breathe, catching other invertebrates or even vertebrates such as tadpoles and fish. In the adult (flying) stage, larger species of dragonfly can live as long as four months. Dragonflies have very good eyesight due to their unique eye structure. Dragonflies have about 30,000 facets to their eyes, arranged to give them nearly a 360° field of vision.

Much larger dragonfly species existed in the distant past than occur on earth today. The largest, found as a fossil, is an extinct Protodonata from the Permian period with a wingspan of 70–75 cm (27.5–29.5 in). This compares to 19 cm (7.5 in) for the largest modern species of odonates, the Hawaiian endemic dragonfly, Anax strenuus, and the Central AmericaCentral America is the region of North America located between the southern border of Mexico and the northwest border of Colombia, in South America. Some geographers classify Central America as a large isthmus, and in this geographic sense it sometimes inn giant damselfly, Megaloprepus coerulatus. The smallest modern species recorded is the libellulid dragonfly, Nannophya pygmaea from east AsiaThe continent of Asia is defined by subtracting Europe and Africa from the great land mass of Africa-Eurasia. The boundaries are vague, especially between Asia and Europe: Asia and Africa meet somewhere near the Suez Canal. The boundary between Asia and E with a wing span of only 20 mm, or about 3/4 of an inch.

The Common Green Darner dragonfly (Anax junius) is nicknamed "Darning Needle" because of its body shape. It is one of the biggest and fastest-flying dragonflies. It can reach a blazing speed of 53 miles (85 km) per hour.

2 Some common species

Emperor DragonflyEmperor Dragonfly : Eukaryota : Animalia : Metazoa : Arthropoda : Hexapoda : Insecta : Odonata : Anisoptera : Aeshnidae Anax imperator Binomial name Anax imperator Leach, 1815 The Emperor Dragonfly Anax imperator is a large and powerful species of Europea, Anax imperator
Black-tailed SkimmerBlack-tailed Skimmer : Animalia : Arthropoda : Insecta : Odonata : Anisoptera : Libellulidae Orthetrum cancellatum Binomial name Orthetrum cancellatum Linnaeus, 1758) The Black-tailed Skimmer Orthetrum cancellatum is a European dragonfly. insects., Orthetrum cancellatum
Common WhitetailCommon Whitetail : Animalia : Arthropoda : Hexapoda : Odonata : Anisoptera : Libellulidae : Libellula : lydia Binomial name Libellula lydia Drury, 1770) The Common Whitetail or Long-tailed Skimmer Libellulus lydia is a common dragonfly across much of Nort, Libellula lydia
Migrant HawkerThe Migrant Hawker Aeshna mixta is with its length of 63 mm one of the smaller species of hawker dragonflies. The species prefers still or slow-flowing water and can tolerate brackish sites. The flight period is from July to the end of October. They can b, Aeshna mixta

3 Footnotes

1. Notable physicist Richard Feynman chased dragonflies around a pool once to prove to his friends that, while dragonflies evoke a particular kind of terror in some humans, they are in fact completely harmless.

4 Sources

Silsby, Jill. 2001. Dragonflies of the World. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington D.C. BooksEnthsiast.com

5 External links

6 Photos

7 Dragonfly disambiguation

For the article on the movie, Dragonfly, see Dragonfly (movie).
"Dragonfly" is also a nickname for Bromo-benzodifuranyl-isopropylamine, or Br-DFLY, a psychoactive phenethylamine drug. See Bromo-DragonFLY.

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1 General facts