Love, Dragonflies & Citizen Science

Love

My dad has always been a workaholic. He loves his work and it gives him a focus to feel in control in a chaotic world. The upside is he is an amazingly successful teacher, administrator and scientist. Many, many people’s lives have been positively impacted by his hard work. But there has also been a downside. He is always working. Even when he is physically home, he is working.

My mom sacrificed a lot to support his career. She gave up pursuing her own advanced degree in biochemistry to support his bid to be a plant pathology professor. She worked in his lab, helped to type his papers and traveled with him internationally to go to scientific meetings and work in foreign tomato fields, especially in Guatemala.

Over the years, the details have changed. He now serves on the Verona Town Board, chairs one of their committees and does genetic consulting work for a researcher in California. But the big picture remains the same. Dad is still working constantly.

So, after 56 years of practice, Mom is speaking up assertively. She wants to do more things together.

Citizen Science

Mom and Dad have lived in the Sugar River Watershed for almost 40 years. Mom saw an article in The Upper Sugar River Watershed Association newsletter requesting volunteers to help out with a dragonfly monitoring project. She suggested they could volunteer for the project as a way to spend more time together. Dad agreed and so they are part of 20-30 citizen scientists trained as dragonfly monitors. They spend some time almost every day looking for and identifying dragonflies.

One of my daughters and I joined them recently at the Verona Town Hall pond for one of their dragonfly outings. Dragonflies have always just been dragonflies for me in the past. As much as I love watching them zip by, they usually come and go so fast that I had never been inspired to take the time to learn more about them. Wow have I been missing out!

Dragonflies

Dragonflies belong to an order called Odanta, or toothed ones, so named for their jagged edged mandibles. They pre-date dinosaurs. Fossils have been found dating back 300 million years. Some of these dragonflies had a two foot wing span.

Today, there are 5000 dragonfly species, spread across all continents except Antarctica. There are 300-350 species in the US, 150-175 in Wisconsin, and about 75 in Dane County, where my parents and I live. We saw seven of these species on our adventure with them: black saddlebag, blue dasher, common whitetail, eastern pondhawk, green darner, twelve spotted skimmer, and widow skimmer.

Dragonflies have four wings that they can control independently. They can fly up to 35 miles per hour when flying forward, but they can also hover, rotate 360 degrees in place, as well as fly upside down and even backwards.

Dragonflies have compound eyes, meaning that each ‘eye’ is actually made up of many tiny eyes, called omatidia. The 24,000 omatidia that each dragonfly possesses gives it incredibly sharp vision that reaches a near 360 view, with only a small blind spot directly behind it.

This visual acuity, along with their flight abilities, makes them excellent hunters and has earned them the nickname of the Hawks of the Insect World.

Adult dragonflies skillfully catch and eat insects and invertebrates while in flight. In a single day, one dragonfly can eat between 30 and several hundred mosquitoes. One dragonfly species, the eastern pondhawk, is known for eating large numbers of agricultural pests every day. The dragonflies, in turn, make tasty meals for birds and frogs.

The adults live for as little as one week and sometimes up to a year. Before they emerge as adults, dragonflies live 2-3 years as nymphs in fresh water. The nymphs eat insects and invertebrates, including mosquito larvae. The older nymphs, which have molted 10-12 times to accommodate growth, will even eat tadpoles and small fish.

Biomimicry

Biomimicry refers to using nature-inspired strategies in designing innovations to promote a sustainable future. A group of students in the Netherlands used the dragonfly as inspiration for developing the world’s smallest flying robot. Known as the Delfly, this tiny robot flaps its wings just like a dragonfly. Its wingspan is only 10cm and it weighs only 3g.

Conservation

Dragonflies are of particular interest because they are environmental indicators. When dragonfly populations are healthy, this indicates that that the aquatic ecosystems and food chains that they rely on are also healthy. If water is polluted damaging dragonfly habitat, or if there is widespread use of broad spectrum insecticides killing off dragonfly food sources, dragonfly populations suffer.

Dragonflies are low on the food chain. Studying their numbers and health reveals changes in water ecosystems more quickly than studying other plants or animals. For this reason, the Upper Sugar River Watershed Association is not the only group monitoring dragonfly populations. The National Park Service has also instigated a dragonfly monitoring project. And Wisconsin has a statewide monitoring project, looking for more citizen science volunteers. For more information about how to get involved, watch the video below.

I hope you are inspired to pay more attention to dragonflies and consider getting involved in a citizen science monitoring project. I would love to hear about your adventures in the comment section below.

Resources

Why are Dragonflies Important?

Dragonflies, Hawks of the Insect World, are Important Environmental Indicators

Wisconsin Dragonfly and Damselfly Survey

Smithsonian Magazine Dragonfly Facts