A Fragile Forktail Damselfly at Rest

This damselfly, a Fragile Forktail, was perched on some sort of vegetation protruding from the water. You can see 1 of their more helpful field marks, exclamation points [1] on their thorax [2] pretty clearly. Less easy to see is the forked tail that indicates this as 1 of our forktail damselflies. You also can't see it clearly in this Eastern Forktail from the previous year; I continue to blame this on their small size. 

Now you know how it got the forktail part of its name. It's claimed that it got the fragile part of its name because of the delicate body/wings of these damselflies. While I'm sure the body and wings are delicate by human standards, I'm really not convinced that they're more fragile than the body and wings of other forktail damselflies; certainly none of them evoke an image of robustness or strength. It's not like the description is wrong, it's just that the description also seems to be true of our other forktails.

Though male forktails (like this 1) are generally green, this isn't a strict rule.

Though I don't see a lot of these damselflies, it's possible that they're numerous for short periods of time in certain localities.

May 11, 2023 at Great Swamp
Photo 282421782, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC)

[1] One is visible; the other is on the other side of the damselfly.

[2] Insects have 3 main body parts which are pretty easy to differentiate in odonates like damselflies and dragonflies. There's the head that's attached to the thorax where all the legs/wings protrude from, and then there's a long abdomen.

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