Blue Dragonfly

The previous "Obelisking Dragonfly" I dubbed a Blue Dasher even  though he/she was brown and yellow. Some of you wondered about that.  With this posting you can see the namesake!  The male Blue Dasher is a beauty, the color of a clear sky.  Some dragonflies spend most of their time flying, while others perch.  Dashers are perchers.  This smart fellow spends his days poised on a branch of my native salvia where the blue blossoms afford him some camouflage.  The little Blue Dasher, Pachydiplax longipennes, like other dragonflies, will eat what it can catch.  I have seen these guys swoop repeatedly through a cloud of gnats - like sharks through a school of little fish.