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FAMILY
LIBELLULIDAE
- This page contains information and pictures about Black-headed Skimmer Dragonflies that we found in the Brisbane area, Queensland, Australia.
They are also known as Blue Scarlet.
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 - Male, body length 45mm
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The male Black-headed Skimmer has black head, black thorax and blue abdomen, with a
dark blue
line along the top of abdomen. Their wings are clear.
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 - Female
Male
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- The female is yellow in colour, with a black line along the top of abdomen.
The matured Black-headed Skimmer females can be in two colour forms, either
yellow brown or blue like the male. Hindwings base of female are
smoky brown.
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  - Larval exuviae, length 25mm
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- They are one of the most common
dragonflies in Brisbane. They can be found on still and slowly running waters.
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- In Brisbane there are some other blue dragonflies, the Blue Skimmer
and the Palemouth, with similar colour and size. They can be found at the same
habitats. They can
be distinguished
by Black-headed Skimmer has the dark head/thorax and wider abdomen.
Palemouth is smaller. In both
species the female are in brownish yellow colour. The Black-headed Skimmer female
has the black line at the middle of the boarder abdomen.
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- We observed that the Black-headed Skimmers mated in wheel position
took only a few seconds, when both female and male are still in air. Then they separate
with the male guarding the female for laying eggs. The female dip the tip of
her abdomen quickly onto the water surface. Details please also visit this page.
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  -
- The above pictures were taken in a very hot day. The dragonfly perches with
abdomen pointing towards the sun, i.e., reduces the body surface on
sunlight, to reduce the heat absorbed. Many Skimmers
perch in this way in a hot day.
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 - Young male, body colour just turn
blue.
Old male, with darker colour and wear-off wings.
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- The above pictures show a young male and an old male. The immature male is yellow brown in colour, same colour as the female. They are sometime found hiding among
the vegetations near the waters. He will turn into blue colour and
return to its breeding ground when matured, i.e., one or two weeks after
emerged.
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- The mature male is powdered blue in colour. In the above second picture,
we can tell the dragonfly is
old by the wear off of its wings. Notice that the colour of each side of the
abdomen is darker. This is due to consequence mating, the blue colour is robbed off
by the female when in wheel position.
The scratched deep blue colour in the above picture indicated that the male dragonfly
has mated many times.
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-
 
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- As most Skimmers, this dragonfly rest with wings hold forward and
depressed.
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- Reference:
- 1. The Australian Dragonflies - CSIRO, Watson, Theisinger & Abbey,1991,
p244.
- 2. A
Field Guide to Dragonflies of South East Queensland - Ric Nattrass, 2006,
p87.
- 3. The Complete Field Guide to Dragonflies of Australia - CSIRO, Günther Theischinger and John Hawking, 2006,
p262.
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