Splendid Clubtail Dragonfly: Big, Clubbed Body, Long Legs, Small Head

Summary: North American splendid clubtail dragonfly habitats get wide-set eyes, small heads, long legs and black-green-yellow chunky thoraxes and clubbed abdomens.

closeup of splendid clubtail dragonfly (Gomphus lineatifrons); Merrimac Farm Wildlife Management Area; Aden, Prince William County, Northern Virginia; Saturday, June 15, 2013: Judy Gallagher (judygva), CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Flickr

North American splendid clubtail dragonfly habitats allow arborists, gardeners and naturalists into distribution ranges in Alabama, Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia and Wisconsin.

Splendid clubtails bear their common name for bright markings, large sizes and clubbed abdomens and the scientific name Gomphus lineatifrons ([crossbow arrow-like] bolt [and] lined foreheads). Common names communicate scientific committee consensus in the Dragonfly Society of the Americas, whose 31st Bulletin of American Odonatology conveys a checklist of odonates in Canada. Scientific designations defer to descriptions in 1921 by Philip Powell Calvert (Jan. 29, 1871-Aug. 23, 1961), cataloguer of odonates around and in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in 1893.

Splendid clubtail life cycles expect clean, clear, fast-flowing, small- to medium-sized rivers with cobble, gravel, rocky, sandy and silty bottoms, overhanging vegetation, riffles and sunny clearings.

May through July function as earliest to latest flight seasons even though May and June furnish wildlife mapping opportunities throughout all North American splendid clubtail niches.

Splendid clubtails go on feeding forays at near-ground and weed-top levels and to shady, sunny perches on dark riffles, rocks and shorelines and on waterside vegetation. They heel heavily around on long hind legs to head in a different direction and hover over riffles with thin abdomens held at 20 degree angles. Their itineraries include infrequent, slow patrols and immobile interludes as sallier perchers like broadwings, dancers, nonglider nonsaddlebag skimmers and spreadwings that imprison and ingest opportunistic prey.

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

Immature splendid clubtails keep to cobble, gravel-, rock-, sand-, silt-kind camouflage and wide sizes even though adults know green to turquoise eyes and green-and-yellow-marked black bodies.

Incompletely metamorphosing life cycles lead from round eggs loosened from female abdomens intermittently over water to multimolting, nonflying larvae, naiads or nymphs and to molted tenerals. Immature, little adult-like hatchlings metamorphose into shiny-winged, tender-bodied, weak-flying tenerals that master permanent colors and physical and sexual maturation, mate and manipulate eggs into ovipositing sites. Aphids, beetles, borers, caddisflies, copepods, crane flies, dobsonflies, gnats, leafhoppers, mosquitoes, rotifers, scuds, water fleas and worms nourish common clubtail members of the Gomphidae dragonfly family.

North American splendid clubtail dragonfly habitats offer north- to southward, season-coldest temperatures from minus 25 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 31.66 to minus 12.22 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 splendid clubtails.

Black- and green-yellow-striped thoraxes, egg mass-thickened ovipositors, green eyes, green-yellow-sided, spotted and striped black abdomens with semi-clubbed tips and two claspers qualify as adult female hallmarks. Adult males reveal black, long legs, black-, cross-lined gray faces, green to turquoise eyes, black-and-green-striped bulky thoraxes, yellow-blotched, spotted, striped black clubbed abdomens and three claspers. Adults show off 2.64- to 2.72-inch (67- to 69-millimeter) head-body lengths, 1.81- to 2.05-inch (46- to 52-millimeter) abdomens and 1.49- to 1.77-inch (38- to 45-millimeter) hindwings.

Green-turquoise, wide-set eyes, small heads, black-green-yellow chunky thoraxes, clubbed abdomens and long legs tell splendid clubtails from other odonates in North American splendid clubtail dragonfly habitats.

splendid clubtail dragonfly (Gomphus lineatifrons); photo by Jonathan White: FotoPhysis @Fotophysis, via Twitter Feb. 24, 2016

Acknowledgment

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

Image credits:

closeup of splendid clubtail dragonfly (Gomphus lineatifrons); Merrimac Farm Wildlife Management Area; Aden, Prince William County, Northern Virginia; Saturday, June 15, 2013: Judy Gallagher (judygva), CC BY 2.0 Generic, via Flickr @ https://www.flickr.com/photos/52450054@N04/9055534804/

splendid clubtail dragonfly (Gomphus lineatifrons); photo by Jonathan White: FotoPhysis @Fotophysis, via Twitter Feb. 24, 2016, @ https://twitter.com/Fotophysis/status/702458152793579520

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; Oxford UK: Princeton University Press, 2005.

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

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

Bright, Ethan. "Gomphurus lineatifrons (Calvert, 1921: 222 as Gomphus) -- Splendid Clubtail." Aquatic Insects of Michigan > Odonata (Dragon- and Damselflies) of Michigan > Anisoptera Selys, 1854 -- Dragonflies > Gomphidae (Clubtails) > Gomphurus Needham, 1901 (common name TBD).
Available @ http://www.aquaticinsects.org/sp/Odonata/sp_oom.html

Calvert, Philip P. "Gomphus dilatus, vastus, and a New Species, lineatifrons (Odonata): Gompus lineatifrons new species." Transactions of the American Entomological Society, vol. XLVII, no. 3 (September 1921): 222-224. Philadelphia PA: The American Entomological Society at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, 1921.
Available via Biodiversity Heritage Library @ https://biodiversitylibrary.org/page/4822695

FotoPhysis @Fotophysis. "Splendid Clubtail, Gomphus lineatifrons." Twitter. Feb. 24, 2016.
Available @ https://twitter.com/Fotophysis/status/702458152793579520

"Gomphurus lineatifrons." James Cook University-Medusa: The Odonata - Dragonflies and Damselflies > Anisoptera > Gomphidae > Gomphurus.
Available via James Cook University-Medusa @ https://medusa.jcu.edu.au/Dragonflies/openset/displaySpecies.php?spid=1219

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

"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/