True Dragon-flies

(Family Gomphidae.)

In this family and the following ones the wings are held horizontally when the insects are in repose; also the eyes are not pop eyes. This group is also by late authors considered a subfamily of the AEschnidae, and is then called Gomphinae. They are separated from their nearest allies from the fact that their eyes are widely separated. The species are rather large, and with certain forms the end of the abdomen appears much swollen, especially in the male; as, for example, in the interesting form known as Gomphus vastus Walsh.

Kellicott says of these dragon-flies: "Their habits are various. Some are found only about the rapid streams or wave-tossed lakes; others by reedy pools; while others haunt sloughs mantled by lily pads. They do not fly about in apparent sportiveness, as do the Libellulas. The females rest among the adjacent foliage or on the ground in some nearby pathway, repairing at intervals to the water's edge or skimming the roughened surface of the rapid stream or disturbed lake for oviposition. The males rest nearer the water, skirt the bordering aquates, or explore the water far from shore in search of the ovipositing females. Copulation is at rest in low herbage or high up in trees. The female oviposits unattended by the male, and the eggs are washed from the tip of the abdomen by repeated dips into the water either in some quiet nook among the weeds or in other species far out on the rough surface of swift stream or wind-disturbed lake. Most species fly in early summer, some in mid, and a few late in summer."