Golden-ringed dragonfly survey
Have you seen a Golden-ringed dragonfly this year?
The golden-ringed dragonfly is one of the largest British dragonflies and you are unlikely to confuse it with any other British species.
It is widespread across much of Britain but tends to favour the north and west of the country, being scarce or absent from much of central and eastern England.
It is especially characteristic of hilly, moorland habitats up to an altitude of 1,500 metres or so. The first individuals appear at the end of May and can be seen on the wing until the end of September but they are most often seen in July and August.
Golden-ringed dragonflies are strong, agile, rapid flyers and fearsome predators, capable of taking large insects such as beetles, wasps, bumble bees or even other small dragonflies and damselflies but their diet is usually made up of small flies and midges.
We need your help
There are very few records of golden-ringed dragonflies in the Yorkshire Dales National Park even though much of the habitat seems suitable enough to support a healthy population of these wonderful insects. So we’d like your help in identifying sites where they can be seen throughout the National Park.
For a detailed description of how to identify the golden-ringed dragonfly, please download a copy of our factsheet by clicking on the link below:
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Once you’ve spotted one, please send us details. You can either fill our online form or you can download a copy of the form by clicking on the link below and either email this to dragonfly@yorkshiredales.org.uk, hand it in at a National Park Centre or send it to us at our Grassington office.
If you are able to take a photograph to verify your sighting, you can email this to us too.
Data collected as part of this survey will be added to the Yorkshire Dales National Park species dataset and will also be passed to the Dragonfly Recording Network (DRN) database. The DRN is an important sub-group of the British Dragonfly Society
