Green Eyes

In the middle of making coffee, the phone ringing and this gorgeous dragonfly suddenly coming through the door and whirring round my head, I went from laid back Sunday morning relaxation into: 'Aargh where's the camera?' 'Where's the lens?' 'It could be an emergency - answer the phone!!' 'Nooo my tripod's in the car!' I whirled round just as fast as she did. Not wanting to be chasing it through the entire house we shot round closing the doors and I just hoped it would settle for a short time - just enough to give me a window of opportunity for a shot! I have rotated this to see it better.

Balancing seemingly on each chair respectively, a stool, a couple of benches zipping the tripod up and down dependant on where it settled - I was in fact having a ball :)) No way was I going to let the summer go without another dragon as a parting shot! What a beauty with it's deep green and brown colourings, slightly ragged wings but still she captured my heart here.

The head of the dragon is quite segmented. There are two large compound eyes, two antennae which you can clearly see with three ocelli or smaller eyes in between them. The blue bottom segment here is the mandible above which is the labrum or lower lip of the mouth which can shoot forward to catch prey. Above that you have the clypeus and then the frons.

My other dragonfly shots from my escapade this morning, all up close and personal and one where it is even going to the loo

Any thought about doing Paladian's challenge went out of the window today - so sorry for that Paladian but there is no deadline so feel I'm ok.