An iNaturalist Finds New Damselfly for Vermont

It was a routine warm September day in the field for naturalist Joshua Lincoln. Wandering along the Waterbury Reservoir shoreline, his net was swiping at mostly Darners – recording Lance-tipped, Lake, and Shadow darners with his camera before releasing them. He stalked a pair of Orange Bluet damselflies to photograph. Thirty minutes later, he captured several closeup images of a blue damselfly perched on vegetation, a group that is notoriously hard to identify.

“I didn’t have my glasses on,” explained Lincoln. “Usually I can get a good enough photos to identify bluets that are perched, from their terminal appendages, when I get home. So I concentrate on getting good photos to identify when I download them. I was completely surprised when I saw my photos.”

He had found Vermont's first state record of Double-striped Bluet (Enallagma basidens) and added it to iNaturalist Vermont for the Vermont Damselfly and Dragonfly Atlas at the Vermont Atlas of Life (VAL), where others quickly confirmed his identification.

Read more at the VCE Blog.

Publicado el 23 de octubre de 2016 a las 01:36 PM por kpmcfarland