Norfolk Hawker

The optimum conditions for breeding appear to be unspoilt grazing marsh dyke systems with clean, non-saline water, rushy margins, preferably with an abundance of water soldier as well as other aquatic plants.

• Conversion of grazing marsh to arable farming.
• Inappropriate ditch management.
• Nutrients enrichment.
• Pollution.
• The impact of global climate change and fluctuations in water levels.

Listed as Endangered in the British Odonata Red List 2008.

Legally protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.

The Norfolk Hawker was historically restricted in the Broadlands of Norfolk and north east Suffolk. Over the past few decades it has spread and can now also be found in Kent and Cambridgeshire.

Brown Hawker

• Brown wings.
• Blue-brown eyes.
• Blue and yellow markings.

Norfolk Hawker Management Profile

General management principles include maintaining grazing marshes, controlling saline intrusion, controlling nutrient enrichment. There are also best practice guidelines for managing inhabited sites, particularly the dyke vegetation and the surrounding terrestrial habitats.

Work is underway to restore habitats for this species in Norfolk.

• Length: 67mm
• Green eyes.
• Brown body.
• Yellow triangular mark near the top of abdomen.
• Males: wasted abdomen
• Females: bulkier abdomen with no waist.

Hawkers have a long streamlined body-shape.

38-44mm

Mask length roughly 3x the width.

Cerci are 2/3rds length of the paraprocts at the end of the abdomen.