LILYPAD FORKTAIL
This is an orange female Lilypad Forktail, photographed at Kiser Lake. These forktails typically perch with the tip of their abdomen pointed downward and touching the lilypad.
This is a male Lilypad Forktail, classified as a species of concern in Ohio. These forktails look similar to Skimming Bluets, but they have larger blue spots behind the eyes and more blue at the abdomen tip. Lilypad Forktails are only found in lakes and ponds where lilypads grow. Most of the places where I hunt for odes do not have waterlilies, and until 2024, I had only seen this species at Kiser Lake in Champaign County.
This is a blue female Lilypad Forktail. Older females turn blue with age.
This is another orange female Lilypad Forktail, photographed at Kiser Lake. Lilypad Forktails have a couple of broods in Ohio. I have seen them from May through August, but they can also fly later in the fall.
In 2024, I finally found a Lilypad Forktail at Spring Valley Wildlife Area in Warren County (the individual shown at left). There were older records of this species from Spring Valley Wildlife Area, and I had searched this location extensively in recent years, without success. But persistence finally paid off when I found this lone male at Spring Valley on August 4, 2024.