would dragonflies mate in a desert with no large water mass around?
Category: Dragonfly Questions and Answers
i have heard that dragonflies only mate near water. i live in the Mojave desert in california and in my city we have an old river that is all dried up. we haven’t had water in tit for years since the flood.
i just walked outside my house to get the mail and i saw a huge swarm of dragonflies. i think they were mating but im not sure why they were here. is there any one who can explain that?
They were not mating because they only mate when they are grounded. They were most likely feeding. I have seen this happen a lot, especially when there were a lot of other, smaller insects.
Dragonflies and Damselflies MUST have water, somewhere, some place, to reproduce. It can be a bucket of rain water some place. It can be a swimming pool.
Mating can take place anywhere, but egg laying must be in the water, because their whole life cycle depends on water. The larval stage, or nymph, of these creatures lives underwater and feeds on other water insects, tadpoles, fish, and other creatures. When it reaches full size it crawls up a plant stem, the skin of the back cracks open, and out climbs an adult Dragonfly or Damselfly. Then the whole process starts over.
Dragonflies will fly around many different places, especially where the small insects that they feed upon fly around. If there are lots of tiny insects, like Mosquitoes or Gnats, in a particular area, there will the Dragonflies be also.