Meet Blue Sapphire, the Dragonfly!

I visited the Arboretum very briefly around noon on this day. I am usually a morning visitor, and I don't often see dragonflies then. But a noon visit to the lily pond brought me nose to nose with several lovely dragonflies!

One of the tricks of photographing dragonflies is to learn how to stalk them. If you see one land, even if it gets up and goes somewhere else for a while, if you watch the spot where it originally landed, it will often return. And so that is what I did. I became a dragonfly stalker.

Several of the Arboretum's dragonflies were using the signs that identify the water lily varieties as mini heli-pads for their take-offs and landings, and I staked one out, sitting quietly nearby with my camera ready.

I enjoyed this particularly friendly dragonfly, which treated me to several close views. Its nose was as blue and sparkling as a sapphire, and thus it earned its name; meet Blue Sapphire, the dragonfly!

The soundtrack has to be a song about blue, and so here is Lou Gramm, who was once the lead singer of the 1980s British-American super-group, Foreigner, with Midnight Blue.