Pale Bluet Damselfly Habitats: Pale Mates High up in Woody Plants

Summary: North American pale bluet damselfly habitats from Virginia to Louisiana get pale-bodied pond damsels mating high up in bushes, shrubs and trees.

illustration in Francis Metcalf Root's 1923 description of the Pale Bluet damselfly (Enallagma pallidum); Entomological News, vol. XXXIV (July 23, 1923), page 203: Public Domain, via Biodiversity Heritage Library

North American pale bluet damselfly habitats assent less to cultivation because of sogginess than to naturalism due to distribution ranges in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia.

Pale bluets bear their common name from pallid black, blue and tan colors and the scientific name Enallagma pallidum (together [in ovipositing] damselfly [with] pallid [colors]). Common names correlate with the consensus of scientific committees convened by the Dragonfly Society of the Americas, whose collecting policies never condone sale for commercial purposes. Designations develop descriptions in 1923 by Francis Metcalf Root (Sept. 24, 1889-Oct. 21, 1934) of Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland.

Pale bluet damselfly life cycles expect lakes, ponds and slow streams with bushy borders, emergent vegetation, protruding aquatic sticks, shaded shorelines, shrubby sides and swampy soils.

April through August function as maximum, most southerly flight seasons even though April through June furnish wildlife mapping opportunities in all eight Atlantic and Gulf states.

Male pale bluets go to shallow waters near shaded shorelines for daytime foraging and pre-mating perching on low-lying stems of emergent vegetation or on water sticks. They hone the gleaning hunting styles of all pond damsels other than dancer sallier perchers by heading out from immobilized perching after low-flying, low-lying food sources. Daytime itineraries include immobilizing edible passersby within clawed, spurred, three-segmented legs and lower lips and initiating mating and ovipositing (egg-laying) while night-time itineraries involve resting roosts.

Ants, assassin flies, biting midges, ducks, falcons, fish, flycatchers, frogs, grebes, lizards, spiders, turtles and water beetles and mites jeopardize North American pale bluet damselfly habitats.

Immature pale bluets keep dull, faded, light, pale colors on small bodies whereas adults know feminine blue, brown, green, tan and masculine blue and black coloration.

Incompletely metamorphosing life cycles link rod-shaped eggs laid in stems above or just below water surfaces, little adult-like multi-molting, non-flying larvae, naiads or nymphs and tenerals. Shiny-winged, soft-bodied, weak-flying tenerals mature three weeks after molting in order to meet low down, mate high up in bushes and trees and oviposit low down. Bluet members of the Coenagrionidae pond damsel family need aphids, beetles, borers, caddisflies, copepods, crane flies, dobsonflies, gnats, leafhoppers, mosquitoes, rotifers, scuds, water fleas and worms.

North American pale bluet damselfly habitats offer season-coldest temperature ranges, north- to south-ward, from 0 to 25 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 17.77 to minus 3.88 degrees Celsius).

Beech, bellflower, birch, bladderwort, cattail, daisy, grass, greenbrier, heath, laurel, madder, maple, nettle, olive, pepperbush, pine, pondweed, rush, sedge, water-lily and willow families promote pale bluets.

Blue-tan eyes, blue-segmented, blue-tipped, long, pale-sided, slender black abdomens and pale blue-green heads and thoraxes with black-edged tan-brown midlines and shoulder stripes quicken adult female identifications. Males reveal black eye-stripes, shoulder stripes and thin midlines, blue thoraxes, blue-tipped, pale-ringed, pale-sided black abdomens with blue terminal segments and pale blue eyes and heads. Adults show off 1.18- to 1.42-inch (30- to 36-millimeter) head-body lengths, 0.91- to 1.14-inch (23- to 29-millimeter) abdomens and 0.63- to 0.79-inch (16- to 20-millimeter) hindwings.

Dark-looking, long, slender abdomens, mating high up and pale-looking heads, thoraxes and tips tell pale bluets from relatives in overlapping North American pale bluet damselfly habitats.

Steven M. Noble, scientist with the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation's (DCR) Division of Natural Heritage, noted in the 1994 issue of Banisteria that the four male and four female Pale Bluet damselflies (Enallagma pallidum) captured May 26, 1938, by collector Mary Eleanor Davis-Ries (1870-1967) at the Lake Drummond Feeder Ditch (lower center of trail map) comprise the only record for the odonate in Virginia; U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge Trails (January 2019): Public Domain, via U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

illustration in Francis Metcalf Root's 1923 description of the Pale Bluet damselfly (Enallagma pallidum); Entomological News, vol. XXXIV (July 23, 1923), page 203: Public Domain, via Biodiversity Heritage Library @ https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/2621221

Steven M. Noble, scientist with the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation's (DCR) Division of Natural Heritage, noted in the 1994 issue of Banisteria that the four male and four female Pale Bluet damselflies (Enallagma pallidum) captured May 26, 1938, by collector Mary Eleanor Davis-Ries (1870-1967) at the Lake Drummond Feeder Ditch (lower center of trail map) comprise the only record for the odonate in Virginia; U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), Great Dismal Swamp National Wildlife Refuge Trails (January 2019): Public Domain, via U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service @ https://www.fws.gov/uploadedFiles/GreatDismalSwampTrails2019-reduced.pdf

For further information:

Abbott, John C. Dragonflies and Damselflies of Texas and the South-Central United States: Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma and New Mexico. Princeton NJ; and Oxford UK: Princeton University Press, 2005.

Beaton, Giff. Dragonflies & Damselflies of Georgia and the Southeast. Athens GA; and London UK: University of Georgia Press, 2007.

Berger, Cynthia. Dragonflies. Mechanicsburg PA: Stackpole Books: Wild Guide, 2004.

Bright, Ethan. "Enallagma exsulans (Hagen, 1861: 82 as Agrion) -- Stream Bluet." Aquatic Insects of Michigan > Odonata (Dragon- and Damselflies) of Michigan > Zygoptera Selys, 1854 > Coenagrionidae, Kirby, 1890 (Pond Damselflies) > Enallagma Selys, 1875 (Bluets).
Available @ http://www.aquaticinsects.org/sp/Odonata/sp_oom.html

"Enallagma exsulans." James Cook University-Medusa: The Odonata - Dragonflies and Damselflies > Zygoptera > Coenagrionidae > Enallagma.
Available via James Cook University-Medusa @ https://medusa.jcu.edu.au/Dragonflies/openset/displaySpecies.php?spid=3678

Paulson, Dennis. Dragonflies and Damselflies of the East. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press, Princeton Field Guides, 2011.

Roble, Steven M. "A Preliminary Checklist of the Damselflies of Virginia,with Notes on Distribution and Seasonality (Odonata: Zygoptera)." Banisteria, no. 4 (1994): 1-21.
Available @ https://virginianaturalhistorysociety.com/banisteria/pdf-files/ban4/Ban_4_Roble_Damselflies.pdf

Root, Francis Metcalf. "Notes on Zygoptera (Odonata) From Maryland, With a Description of Enallagma pallidum, n. sp.: Enallagma pallidum new species." Entomological News and Proceedings of the Entomological Section of the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, vol. XXXIV (July 1923): 202 Philadelphia PA: The Academy of Natural Sciences, 1923.
Available via Biodiversity Heritage Library @ https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/2621221

"The 2012 USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map." The National Gardening Association > Gardening Tools > Learning Library USDA Hardiness Zone > USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map.
Available @ https://garden.org/nga/zipzone/2012/