“Now hang on a minute” I hear you say….“How do you know it’s not a Cordulegaster bidentatus?”. Well, obviously, the occipital triangle just behind the eyes is yellow and not black plus it has the additional narrow banding on the abdomen not present in C bidentatus.At least, I dare say that such a thing will be “obvious” to the countless, googling, armchair-bound “experts” out there in the ether who apparently take (I’m reliably informed) great delight in drawing attention to my (admittedly) almost trade-mark identification mistakes featured throughout these sites.However, I do think I should explain that there’s really nothing for anyone to worry about because we actually have our own, “proper” expert (who rarely needs to google anything) working within the UKNR set-up whose primary remit it is to read through the hurriedly-typed weekly reports and assorted mish-mash of data submitted by we humble rangers and to correct our many mistakes before they are finally sent abroad for analysis.

Meanwhile, I eventually managed to photograph this beautiful, but very skittish creature on a warm, sunny late afternoon in mid-September in a hedgerow on the edge of an ancient woodland situated in a valley not far from Crackington Haven, North Cornwall. It was one of a pair. Tess and I had walked a very long way that day and I allowed her to cool off by going for a swim in a ford that we’d discovered en route. She repaid me immediately afterwards by drawing my attention to the Dragonflies.