Following the departure from Rawcliffe Meadows of the volunteers from York Cares on the 12 June 2014, I happened to notice a photographer at work in the Reservoir Basin, which contains a number of ponds of differing sizes, shapes and age.

I had a chat with the photographer, asking whether he’d spotted anything of interest, and he informed me about the various dragonflies that had been attracted to the new large pond excavated by MMB for us in the previous summer as part of the funding from Yorkshire Water. Given that the entire Reservoir Basin is pretty boggy from recent rain, we were both being viciously attacked by cleggs and other biting creature whilst we observed one male broad-bodied chaser discourage others from his and his mates territory. The flying skills were spectacular! Other dragonflies and damselflies floated in and out of the demarcation zone but were quickly chased off.

The photographer, Gary Cowl, has kindly sent me some of his photo’s. I present three of them here on the understanding that they are his copyright.

Broad-bodied chaser female 1024×768 (c) Gary Cowl 2014

Damselflies mating (c) Gary Cowl (1024×768)

(c) Gary Cowl (1024×768)