CLOSED: Need help ID'ing this "brown" dragonfly.

I was out in my yard seeing if I could snap a few bird pics and this dragonfly (and another I'll post in a separate thread) were just flying all around me, but they would never land. Remembering how dragonflies would often land of the tip of my cane fishing pole, I got me a coat hanger, cut and straightened it, stick it in the ground and, low and behold, one of the "brown" ones landed right away.

What kind of dragonfly is it, please?

Thanks,
Hack

This one looks like one of the Spotted Skimmers but I can't narrow it down for sure.

Great shots on both , BTW.

This message was edited Jul 9, 2012 9:29 PM

Thanks, at least you gave me a place to start my looking - a kind of Spotted Skimmer.

Maybe someone else will chime in.

And thanks for the compliment on my pics. I tried snapping them in flight - no way.

Hack

Kwanjin,

I think I'll see if it comes back tomorrow and hopefully it will land in such a way that I can snap a pic of the span of its wings. In my pic, the wings "overlap" and I can't get a good look. I looked at lots of pics of Spotted Skimmers and never saw one that I could settle on.

Hack

Yes, please do. I know that there are some variations within species, as well.

Could be a female calico pennant - http://www.cod.edu/people/faculty/chenpe/SCHULENBERG/2007_06_25/Celithemis_elisa-female.jpg

I don't know Flapdoodle, in my pic the black markings extend all the way from the front of the wing to the rear, would that make a difference?

Thanks for offering the help. This has me baffled.

Hack

Brown Spotted Yellow Winged Dragonfly search took me here

http://bugguide.net/node/view/2591

Is this the one?

That appears to be much closer; I wasn't all that confident of my i.d. ...

That does look fairly close.

I love the names some of these are given. Halloween Pennant, Swift Setwing, Amberwing...

Taking off on what kwnajin said, I found another one under the name Halloween Pennant, which is what ellas said.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halloween_Pennant

http://anybodyseenmyfocus.blogspot.com/2010/07/dragonfly-halloween-pennant-celithemis.html

http://www.panoramio.com/photo/15098358

So, I'm gonna say that ellas' ID of Brown Spotted Yellow Winged Dragonfly, Celithemis eponina (AKA Halloween Pennant) is it.

Hack

This message was edited Jul 10, 2012 11:52 AM

I guess one could also call it a Brown Spotted Yellow Winged Skimmer, right?

Hack

Wrong place to post, please ignore.

Hack

This message was edited Jul 27, 2012 1:23 PM