northeast-flora-and-fauna

Those of us living in the real world don't get a chance to see unicorns ... unless they are Unicorn Clubtail dragonflies, that is. But while the mythical unicorn has a very prominent horn, the Unicorn Clubtail has a more modest point on their occiput (an area between the eyes at the top of the head ). Although some descriptions call this point "conspicuous": It's pretty easy to miss it as a field mark, and isn't even easy to see in pictures like the 1 below. On the other hand, if you're an entomologist examining a captured dragonfly , it suddenly becomes a very useful way of identifying these guys. Clubtail dragonflies are a bit different from the average dragonfly:  Their abdomens are mostly thinner than other types of dragonflies, but which widen at the last few segments (S7-S9) into something like a club. At least this is usually true for the clubtails, though there are some species with virtually no club. (Unfortunately for the club analogy, the clubta...

A couple weeks ago at Fairview Farm I met a unicorn! Okay, it's really a Unicorn Clubtail dragonfly. The pond there has sort of a mini-pier that extends out into their pond, and as I went there I saw this largish dark dragonfly perched out there. Though this is the most widespread clubtail in New Jersey, they tend to shy away from us humans. After getting this picture I tried to move in for a closer shot and (hopefully) a view of the face, but the dragonfly up and left. I wasn't able to get any more pictures of it. June 1, 2022 at Fairview Farm Photo 205020424, (c) jpviolette, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC) I had never seen one of these before and didn't know what it was before  posting it in iNaturalist . They got the "unicorn" part of their name from a prominent  occiput , the region of their head that's sort of above/between their compound eyes. If you expand the picture above, I think the "horn" is the slight tip of the lime green area between ...