Miniature Tags Track Dragonflies

celardore writes "BBC News reports about the epic journeys taken by dragonflies searching for warmer climates have been revealed by scientists in the US. The team, led by researchers from Princeton University, found that the insects are capable of flying up to 85 miles (137 km) in a day. Each transmitter weighed about a third of a gram and had enough battery life to track an individual for 10 days; but tagging such small creatures is far from easy. "The challenge is first catching the dragonfly," said Professor Wilcove. Once caught, each transmitter was attached with a couple of drops of superglue and some eye-lash adhesive."

Comments

A similar experiment

[Anonymous Coward]

The same transmitters attached to mosquitos lead to a surprising result: each tagged mosquito stayed in the exact same meter squared for all 10 days of the experiment. Scientists are baffled because previous theories postulated that mosquitos were able to travel much longer distances.

Was I in Dragonfly Heaven?

[Quirk]

On a bicycle trip from Victoria, B.C. to Montreal, Que. I stopped near a small lake in Ontario. The lake was a few hundred yards off the highway. There were no cabins at the near shore off the road and the terrain dropped quickly down 40 or 50 feet at the lake edge to the lake surface.

As I began setting up camp late in the afternoon I began to notice first a couple then dozens of giant neon blue and black dragonflies. After I had set up camp I walked a bit closer to the rock bluff above the lake and sat down. There were untold numbers of dragonflies all around me. Most were quite large but there were also smaller ones. After I settled on an outcropping of Canadian Sheild the dragonflies began to settle on rock and plants everywhere. I sat still and watched what was a surreal dance of hovering and slow moving dragonflies move lazily in the late afternoon summer heat.

Needless to say there wasn't a mosquito to be seen or heard. I'd never before seen so many dargonflies and haven't since. Perhaps it was a hatching site, but the numbers were unestimatable. It was more a work of imagination than reality.

Anyone had a similar experience?

Re:Was I in Dragonfly Heaven?

[Whiney Mac Fanboy]

Sadly, 1/3 of (known) dragonfly species are listed as threatened or endangered on the IUCN Red List of endangered species.

Life that relies on small ponds (rather then larger bodies of water) tends to be quite sensitive to insecticides & pesticides. I suspect the pond you're talking about was nowhere near any orchards (or other commercial farming).

I'ts important to remember that nearly all ponds used to be like the one you're talking about - and could be again, if we just started being a little more sensitive.

One doubt left

[Nuffsaid]

I wonder how far these insects can fly when not burdened with an electronic tag. Or a coconut. African dragonflies, I mean.