Dragonfly Photography

Flies with an Attitude

This story begins when I visited a local stream, with camera in hand, eager to practice macro photography with my new 200mm lens, focusing on fishing flies. The first thing I did was place a realistic housefly on top of a twig, secured my camera onto a tripod, and snapped the image below...

Hand tied realistic fishing fly

After taking the photo above, I realized that noon was not the best time to photograph flies outdoors, the light was too bright, creating unwanted glare on the wings. I decided to keep practicing, and moved in a bit closer with the camera, and being unaccustomed to finding and focusing on such small objects, I struggled to find the fly in the viewfinder. Surprisingly, by the time focus was achieved, the fly was no longer on the twig. After searching for several minutes, crawling around on the ground, on hands and knees, it finally occurred to me, something had taken the fly away, it was nowhere to be found?

After pulling another fly from my box, and deeply embedding the hook into the twig, I positioned my camera, focused though the viewfinder, and took a photo that stuck me as being rather unusual.

orange flame Skimmer dragonfly prying a fly from a twig

A bright orange dragonfly seemed rather determined to pull an easy meal from the twig

Macro photo of an orange dragonfly holding a house fly

Luckily the hook held tight, or another fly would have likely disappeared

macro photography of an orange dragonfly

This beautiful dragonfly was as focused on lunch as my camera was upon it

dragonfly smiling for the camera

Smiling for the camera

orange Flame Skimmer (Libellula saturata) dragonfly

I really like this shot of an orange Flame Skimmer (Libellula saturata) dragonfly, holding my realistic fly

macro orange Flame Skimmer (Libellula saturata) dragonfly photo

This dragonfly pulled vigorously, and became increasingly frustrated, trying to secure an easy meal

One good thing about the mid day light being so bright,
it allowed me to remove my camera from the tripod, and move in closer.

Then it struck me, what would happen if a fake dragonfly from my fly box was placed on the twig...

orange dragonfly on a twig with a realistic blue and yellow dragonfly

Almost immediately the orange dragonfly returned, landed beneath my yellow and blue fly, and slowly creeped closer and closer, but never did make contact. Numerous photos were taken, and a variety of facial expressions seemed evident, including this photo where it appears a mate might have been found. After about 15 minutes of quiet rejection, the orange dragonfly left the scene.

Two realistic flies

I began to wish I had a realistic orange dragonfly to place on the twig, to see what the reaction would be. The closest thing I had was a yellow and brown dragonfly, and perhaps putting some food in its grasp would entice the orange dragon to return.

Orange dragonfly attacking the wings of a realistic dragonfly

It returned with an attitude, no hesitation what so ever, it was time to attack. It was interesting watching how savage and angry the dragonfly's attitude was, clearly trying to tear apart the wings of my replica.

When attacking insects, dragonflies begin by trying to tear and disable the wings of their prey

After a few minutes of furious action, the battle seemed to have been decided, he was king of the twig.

I kept playing, and placed my dragonfly on a different twig,
to see if the orange dragon would return with such a territorial attitude.

Another dragonfly attack

The attack was severe enough that my fake fly was knocked sideways.

Orange dragonfly biting the wings of the realistic fly

He's king of every twig on the stream

By this time my lunch hour was ending and I had a burning desire to go home and tie a realistic orange dragonfly. In fact I don't recall ever being so eager to start tying a fly.

Hand tied realistic dragonfly holding a realistic fishing fly

I returned the next day, with a realistic replica orange dragonfly

Orange dragonfly fiercely attacking the wings of my realistic orange dragonfly

The action was fast and furious!

pair of orange dragonflies

Pretty Bugs

The real orange dragonfly spent about 15 minutes touching and examining my realistic replica dragonfly, and may perhaps have believed it's mate had been found.

At times it seemed as if the king had found his queen

Another orange dragonfly replica

Another fake dragonfly

I have a lot of fun combining my passion for photography with my passion for creating realistic insects

Another attack, trying to disable the wings

I enjoyed the challenge of creating realistic dragonflies, and the unusual part, while fly tying, was not my typical daydreaming about beautiful wild scenery and rivers full of trout, instead envisioning flying bugs, with violent as well as mating attitudes, captured and released with my camera.