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Red-tipped Swampdamsel
Leptobasis vacillans
The Red-tipped Swampdamsel (Leptobasis vacillans) is a tropical species of damselfly which was know to occur north into parts of Mexico. On 22 May 2009, Dr. John Abbott, Kendra Bauer, Dave Welling and I were at Santa Ana N.W.R., Hidalgo Co., Texas, photographing Cream-tipped Swampdamsels (Leptobasis melinogaster) when John called our attention to a small orange damselfly which was later determined to be Red-tipped Swampdamsel (Leptobasis vacillans), a new species for North America. We saw at least 4 individuals on this occasion and all were teneral males which had recently emerged. The first 8 images on this page were taken at the time of the initial discovery with a Canon EOS 1D Mark III and EF 300mm F/4 L IS lens and 2X extender and 580 flash.
In June, 2009, I returned to Santa Ana N.W.R., with Martin Reid, and we were successful in finding ca. 10 different Red-tipped Swampdamsels near the area where they were initially discovered two weeks earlier. The next three shots show a mature male.
The next 3 shots show a young female. She has a prey item in this image.
The next two shots show other mature males.
The image shown here shows a male that is just starting to get mature coloration.