Western Willonw Spreadwing

Description:

This is a large specie of Damselfly, that start to fly in the middle of the summer in southern Spain. It has a really remarkable reproductive behaviour. The most of zygoptera species place the eggs in plant over or under the water surface. Lestes viridis, place it into the bark of riverine trees as Salix, Populus or Alnus. It starts to place them few week after the raining season, really far of the summer main flow of water. The eggs stay inside the bark for few weeks, and when it is raining they hatch to fall down on the water flow due to the massive rain. That is a very interesting and specialized behaviour to the madeiterranean cycle of water, with really dry summer and really wet autumn. Most of stream and rivers in southern Spain have a dramatic descent of water level in summer and a spectacular increase in the middle of autumn.

Habitat:

it occurs near to rapid or middle rapid flows of water.

Notes:

You can watch them in a spectacular number in the middle of august. Other common name is Willow Emerald Damselfly. Some authors include them into the genus Chalcolestes.