Whitten Pond, Burbush Pond, Long Pond

Based on the oh-so-useful Hampshire Dragonflies web-site, we decided to go looking for damsels and dragons around several ponds south of Burley, even though the weather forecast wasn't exactly optimal for 'odos'.

First stop was Whitten pond.

Many common blue damsels on and around the pond, as well as a few red-eyed damsels. 

A few black-tailed skimmers were seen a bit further away from the pond itself, and we saw a single brown hawker near the feeder stream.

In terms of butterflies: lots of gatekeepers again, similar to yesterday. Then on to our next stop, Burbush pond.

Before we saw any dragons or damsels, we saw a silver-studded blue, the second time we saw this species, following spotting a single individual on a drizzly day on Fritham Plain. 

The pond itself had more common blue damsels, several blue-tailed damsels and a single azure damsel.

And then the final pond of the day, Long Pond.

Almost immediately, we saw several small red damsels flying low around the heath surrounding the pond. And then, emerald damselfly, a new species for us!!

This species had been on our wish list for quite a while, so it was great finally seeing a few!

Despite the unfavourable weather, mostly cloudy with occasional rain and drizzle, we saw 12 species of damseldragons, our highest daily number so far!

The tables as always (one = 1; few = 2-4; several = 5-9; many = 10+):