Two more Lestidae from Cat Tien

During my little excursion to Cat Tien, I was able to finally find Orolestes octomaculatus. That was very welcome. James had found one in the lodge, but I had not been able to replicate that record and felt hopelessly left out. This time round I was more lucky. First we found a freshly emerged female in the flooded excavations on the way to the fishponds. Then I found a female smack in the middle of the forest, and finally several males at ponds close to the bird lake trail. It is an easy species to recognize. The female in hand by the 5-6 large teeth on the ovipositor and the male by the 8 spots on the wing.

The other Lestidae I ran into, was a female Lestes elatus, which I found at the fishponds. Luckily an easy species to recognize on account of its patterning. Also apparently common in all sorts of disturbed habitats. I found only one, but at least we know it is there. Hopefully also males next time.

Lestes elatus, a female photographed from some distance

The same female in hand. I am sorry about the prominent finger, but if you check the print, you can see it is me. The pattern on S8-9 is very typical.

Orolestes octomaculatus, not a good photo and with flash, but you can see the typical double-dot pattern on all wings.

Another male, again a little hasty when taking the picture

Female of Orolestes octomaculatus, note the rather different, plain, coloration of S8-9 when compared to female O. selysi (see that post)

Note the large teeth on the ovipositor (same female as in previous picture)

Ovipositing female of Orolestes selysi

This weekend when in Huu Lien I observed several females of Orolestes selysi. I previously only saw males, so for the readers interest, here are some pictures. The female started ovipositing in life wood about 2 meters above a shallow and slow moving stream in a bush. Interestingly, she twisted her abdomen so that sometimes the ovipositor faced left, sometimes right.

The female of Orolestes selysi

Ovipositing with twisted abdomen

Some additional species at Huu Lien from April 21

The two Copera species of Huu Lien and the one Pseudocopera were already common and easily found. Here are the males of P. ciliata and C. marginipes in their full glory.

Pseudocopera ciliata is the easy one, large, and white when mature

Here a male Copera marginipes with its simple, but large superior appendages

A somewhat messier C. marginipes. C. vittata normally has much less white on the last segments.

A remarkable and large species was Orolestes selysi. The dark-winged form and the hyaline form occurred side by side.

A fantastic dark-winged specimen of Orolestes selysi

The somewhat less striking, sorry to say, hyaline version.

I also had the opportunity to take a better look at some immature Orthetrum glaucum.

First, a female Orthetrum glaucum.

A fresh, still less pronounced, female

The interesting immature male. The striking pattern is later completely obscured by pruinosity.

Orolestes selysi

When I first saw this massive Lestidae at Ba Vi on July 13, I was pretty much awe struck. Since then I have been lucky enough to see it at Ba Be National Park in late July and again at Cuc Phuong in early August. Orolestes selysi occurs in two distinct forms, one with largely black wings and one with hyaline wings. The specimens at Ba Vi (1 male) and Ba Be (2 males) had black wings, whereas all the specimens seen in Cuc Phuong (about 10 males) had hyaline wings. I wonder if they occur side by side. Anyway, it is a fantastic species. At Ba Vi it was at a muddy puddle inside the forest, used by water buffalo, at Ba Be in the corner of a shallow pond with overhanging bushes and in Cuc Phuong it was found in inundated grassland bordered by bushes.

Orolestes selysi, male, black-winged form at Ba Vi

Male from Cuc Phuong, clear-winged

Another clear-winged male from Cuc Phuong