Image of Swamp Darner

Description:

"Large dragonfly in the middle of a dried wetland area. First noticed noise of it buzzing in the grass thicket, finally emerged, checked me out and landed nearby. It then proceeded to lay eggs in dried mud around my feet. Interesting to see the ""cerci"" at the tip of the body. In males, these cerci are the claspers that grab onto the female's head during copulation. If it was in fact laying eggs, then a dragonfly female's cerci seem analogous to a male mammal's nipples--fairly useless."