Libélulas de Málaga

25.06.18 A caveat: I have not made any visits in the peak months of July, August and September since 2018 so recent information on this website is limited. As a non-resident I never know the water levels at any of the sites I mention on this website until I arrive on a trip and with the current levels of drought it can be disappointing.

I have been looking for and reporting dragonflies in Málaga province since 2005 and I am now part of the team working on the Málaga dragonfly atlas.

Here you will find a list of the dragonflies which have been recorded in Málaga province with links to individual species pages. I have used the scientific and english names as given in Dijkstra, Schröter & Lewington. The order of species should be the same as in the book.

Additional information can be found on José Manuel Moreno-Benitez's excellent site Libélulas de Málaga which contains maps from the 2013 Atlas (data to 2012).

There is a more recent publication Libélulas de la Gran Senda de Málaga y provincia. Guía de identificación by José Manuel Moreno-Benítez and Javier Ripoll. As well as being an ID guide there is a lot of useful information about habitats and flight times and broad locations. An english language version is now available.

A useful reference source are the bulletins of ROLA (Red de observadores de libélulas en Andalucia) which contain observations recorded at the 1km square level. You will see that there has been quite a lot of observer activity since the atlas was published and so the information on some of the species pages is out of date - I will gradually get them updated!

Another useful source of information are the bulletins of the Asociación odonatológica de Andalucía.

If you use facebook then you might find the following groups useful El rincón de las Libélulas, Asociacion odonatologica de Andalucia (AoA)., Odonatos de Andalucia (now re-labelled Dragonflies of the world!), Odonatos Ibéricos and Libélulas ROLA - or, like me, you might wonder why there is so much need to crosspost!

Note that Macromia splendens, Oxygastra curtisii, Gomphus graslinii and Zygonyx torridus are 'sensitive' species and I will not provide people with detailed information which is not in the ROLA bulletins or in other publications. Onychogomphus costae and Orthetrum nitidinerve are scarce species in Malaga province and I have provided one site for each on the sites page.

There is some information on sites I have visited quite regularly (as a tourist not a resident!).

Lestes barbarus - Migrant Spreadwing

Lestes virens - Small Spreadwing

Lestes macrostigma - Dark Spreadwing

Chalcolestes viridis - Western Willow Spreadwing

Sympecma fusca - Common Winter Damsel

Calopteryx xanthostoma - Western Demoiselle

Calopteryx virgo - Beautiful Demoiselle

Calopteryx haemorrhoidalis - Copper Demoiselle

Platycnemis acutipennis - Orange Featherleg

Platycnemis latipes - White Featherleg

Ischnura elegans - Common Bluetail