I came out to feed the fish yesterday morning and found this brand new dragon fly hanging from his last molt. It seems like the process of a butterfly but is very different.
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Monday Youffraita
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Wednesday Pam from Calif
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Friday FloridaSNMOM
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Dragonflies start as eggs that become nymphs. They live under the water for a few months up to a few years, looking like crickets as far as I am concerned. They have exoskeletons and they split open and emerge from the old, smaller skeleton into a larger nymph. They eat just about anything they can get hold of.
At some point, they climb out of the water and attach their feet to someplace dry. They set to molting for the time and this time the dragonfly drops out through the split, stays attached to the shell for a while and pumps out his wings and body.
It was cold yesterday morning and it took a while for him to start to get warm enough to pump and plump.
His wings are splashed with water from the pond and look so pretty. Eventually, he got all filled out and flew off although I did not see that. I just came back to the picture of the empty shell attached to the pond outflow. You can see that shell pretty well in this picture.
Bill says as a kid in Texas, he used to see them climb up on cattail spikes every summer but I had to wait to be old, retire and have time to watch my pond to see such a miracle.
Have a good day, filled with wonder and surprise.