When I’m writing until the wee hours of the morning, I have a snack of three multi-grain crackers with a glob of crunchy peanut butter and a dab of honey – yummmmyyyy – and I read something different from what I’ve been working on. Yesterday I read a brief article about dragonflies in the American Museum of National History magazine, “Rotunda”: Just so happened that earlier in the day I photographed a dragonfly on a rock in one of our gardens. Here’s my pic and cool facts about dragonflies, an insect you’ll undoubtedly see somewhere this summer, at least I hope you do:
“Darting over the surface of ponds, lakes, marshes, and streams, they can reach speeds of up to 50 miles an hour . . .Using separate sets of muscles for their four wings, these hunters can hover in one place as long as a minute at a time. They can also fly backward, turn upside down, and pivot 360 degrees . . .mechanical engineers are looking to these animals for clues on how to design small drones. . . .dragonflies also have exceptional eyesight. . . . 30,000 facets full of photoreceptors make it possible for them to see everywhere except directly behind them. Researchers have determined that dragonflies have the capacity to pick out individual prey – mosquitos, moths, and other flying insects – within a crowd.”
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