Monmouthshire dragonfly recording update 11, May 2025
Hello and welcome to the second newsletter of the year.
Recording in 2025
Thanks to everyone who has responded to emails from our volunteers Roger and Tom (if you haven’t had one yet, you’ll receive one soon). I’m really pleased that we have so many active dragonfly recorders in the county and that you’re keen to continue this year, either in the areas you already visit or by offering to search new areas to help us expand our knowledge of under-recorded parts of the county.
The flight season for adult dragonflies is now well underway. Now is an ideal time to explore the Gwent Levels: Hairy Dragonfly and Four-spotted Chaser are being seen widely across the Levels this year, and Variable Damselfly has been found at a new site.
Late May into June is also a great time to visit the River Wye for Common Clubtail. Adults have now been seen at Dixton near Monmouth, its most accessible and well-known site, and also at Redbrook and Llandogo. This species is known all along the river between these locations; if you spend a couple of hours walking a stretch of the riverbank at this time of year, you should encounter at least one. Banded Demoiselles and White-legged Damselflies have also been seen this year on the river: both occur here in good numbers.
The following species have also been recorded on the wing in the county so far in 2025: Beautiful Demoiselle, Azure, Common Blue, Large Red, Red-eyed and Blue-tailed Damselflies, Emperor Dragonfly, Four-spotted and Broad-bodied Chaser, and Black-tailed Skimmer.
A LAST MINUTE ADDITION…
Just as I’ve been finalising this newsletter, news has been received of a Scarce Chaser near Magor, a new species for the county. More details will follow in the next newsletter.
Identification training sessions
There has been quite a bit of interest in attending dragonfly identification training sessions. The first one, organised in conjunction with Gwent WIldlife Trust, took place at Magor Marsh last week. I have a further workshop in the calendar for Sunday 13th July at the RSPB visitor centre at Newport Wetlands. These are half-day sessions with a couple of hours indoors (with comfort breaks) running through how to identify dragonflies, followed by time outdoors (as long as the weather co-operates) putting these skills into practice. There’s a small charge for the sessions, to enable costs to be covered. If you’d like to attend one, but haven’t yet registered interest, please get in touch.
Does White-legged Damselfly occur on the Gwent Levels?
There are strong populations of White-legged Damselfly on the Wye and the Usk and some of their tributaries, but there is the intriguing possibility that this species also has at least one population on the Gwent Levels. This species was reported in larval surveys of the reens in 2014 from three locations: near Marshfield in the west, the Nedern Brook near Caldicot, and Monks Ditch between Whitson and Goldcliff. Given that no adult White-legged Damselflies have ever been reported on the Levels, I have followed these records up, and although no more details exist about the first two sites, a specimen was retained from Monks Ditch, and it is very clearly a White-legged Damselfly. The survey results note that 40 of these were recorded at the sampling location. The obvious question is: is this species still there? Monks Ditch runs very close to Goldcliff Pools, one of our best-recorded sites: has White-legged Damselfly been present there undetected for a decade?
Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly, literally
Only one record of Scarce Blue-tailed Damselfly was received in 2024, from its main stronghold in the county near Blaenavon. This species is on the wing by June; it would be great if anyone could keep a particular eye out for it this year to find out if it’s still present at any of its other moorland sites. However, it is a specialist of epheremal pools, and strongly dispersive, so it could potentially be found anywhere within the county. Paul Roberts found it near Llanwern in 2021 and Richard Clarke found it at PontllanFraith in 2022.
Updated atlas maps
As planned, revised species accounts and up-to-date atlas maps for the 32 dragonfly and damselfly species recorded in Monmouthshire are now on the British Dragonfly Society website (click on the link at the bottom of this email). The maps show the position half way through our county atlas project, and I thought it would be interesting to compare and contrast our progress with that for previous atlas projects run in other counties. Courtesy of Steve Cham, one of the co-authors of the Dragonflies of Hampshire (published in 2004), here’s the All Records map as at the end of their atlas period, side-by-side with ours. We’re actually progressing pretty well; so a big thank you to everyone who’s contributed records.
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A new WhatsApp group has been set up to share news about dragonflies in South Wales. If you’d like to join, let me know and I’ll send you a sign-up link.
Dragonflies of the Gwent Levels
As I mentioned in the previous newsletter, a publication on the dragonflies of the Gwent Levels is in preparation. It will include photos, distribution maps and text about each of the species that occur on the Levels. If you’re interested in getting involved with pulling this together, please do get in touch: any help will be appreciated.
Contributing your records
I’m happy to receive your records via any method which suits you: it’s better to receive a record than not to receive it. The iRecord system is my preferred method. If you’d like to use iRecord, please go to irecord.org.uk and create an account. I’m more than happy to show you how to use it over a video conference, or in person if you live somewhere within easy reach.
Steve Preddy, Monmouthshire County Dragonfly Recorder, British Dragonfly Society