As habitats go, this waterlogged ditch doesn’t appear to amount to much – a narrow channel holding a feeble stream, congested with bogbean and cottongrass. And yet this unpromising place is home to an endangered species, and one of our rarest: damselflies.
By this point in the summer, the flight season of the southern damselfly (Coenagrion mercuriale) is drawing to a close. Indeed as I wander this short gully at the western edge of Dartmoor, I find none. But the next generation is there, hidden just beneath the surface, tiny eggs peppering the aquatic vegetation. Soon the larvae will be hatching.
