Dragonfly Season
RTPI Affiliate Sean Graesser is excited it is dragonfly season once again – what about you? Yep, this is more nature art, or art of nature, but it really is all the same. Photographed for the Meet Your Neighbours global biodiversity project while on assignment for The Roger Tory Peterson Institute of Natural History.
Read MoreLightning Strike
There has been a lot of inclement weather lately! One good thing about all of the heavy rain and thunderstorms is that our waterways will be filled for reptiles, amphibians, odonates, and many other creatures. It may not make our work easier – for example, the Spiny Softshell Turtles are going to be a tough study for now – but it is certainly a far better fate than the droughts of places like California. Thankfully for them we have signs of a strengthening El Niño, the periodic warming of the Pacific Ocean’s surface temperatures, that may already be giving them slight...
Read MoreJune temperatures and precipitation
Having spent time in New York, Pennsylvania and Connecticut in different parts of June I heard a variety of classifications about the late spring and early summer temperature and precipitation conditions. The Northeast region had varied weather and even more mixed opinions on what it felt like outside during the month. To those back home in Connecticut the weather had been dry and quite cool. This was a “classic” spring, even to people in their 20s, without heat waves, incessant air quality alerts and air conditioning running nonstop. Folks in Western New York and Northwestern...
Read MoreDelta-spotted Spiketail (Cordulegaster diastatops)
Another day, another location with a Delta-spotted Spiketail (Cordulegaster diastatops)..this time in Warren County, Pennsylvania. I had over 25 dragonfly and damselfly species at one spot including another new county record. Meanwhile Twan also added a new county ode in Chautauqua. More to come..
Read MoreDragonflies and damselflies weekend
Twan and I spent the weekend searching for and netting various dragonflies and damselflies across Chautauqua County in a “divide and conquer” sweep of as many sites as we could hit. The number of natural areas we have to search is overwhelming. While surveying we also recorded birds, butterflies, reptiles, amphibians…you get the picture. It’s a sensory overload! Last year we added several new odonate county records in Chautauqua, Cattaraugus, Warren and more. This included the Delta-spotted Spiketail mere minutes from RTPI. I was able to find another population of the...
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