Odonata sightings have continued throughout this last period, with both Common Darter (Sympetrum striolatum), and Blue-tailed Damselfly (Ischnura elegans) making one day only appearances on the 18th and 19th of July, respectively.
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| Common Darter |
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| Blue-tailed Damselfly |
Also, on the 18th Emperor Dragonfly (Anax imperator) made it on to the garden list when I observed a single male flying over the wildflower lawn. The visit was short-lived, and the dragonfly has not reappeared again since then.
On the 21st of July when carefully cleaning green algae from New Pond provided an opportunity to observe both damselfly nymphs and a dragonfly nymph cast.
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| Damselfly nymph |
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| Dragonfly nymph exuvia |
Other recent and interesting additions to the garden list have included two stonking flies. The Banded General (Stratiomys potamida) on the 26th of June, and Dark Giant Horsefly (Tabanus sudeticus) on the 13th of July.
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| Banded General |
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| Dark Giant Horsefly |
Addendum
In December 2025 the iRecord submission for Dark Giant Horsefly (Tabanus sudeticus) was verified by Martin Harvey and the record was aggregated.
Martin's comment as follows: "Redetermined from species Tabanus sudeticus (Dark Giant Horsefly) to species aggregate Tabanus bovinus/sudeticus agg. This is probably sudeticus, but it does seem rather pale and at this location I don't think we can completely rule out bovinus."
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