August is a time for multitasking by our dragonflies and damsel flies. They’re extraordinarily busy eating thousands of mosquitoes and other little pests, mating with their kind and laying eggs before the cold weather comes.
It also seems to be a time when recurring myths about them are resurrected. Remember, dragonflies will NOT sting you or your horse or put a mouth-stitching curse on children who lie. Damselflies are NOT female dragonflies, and they won’t sting or curse you either. ALL these insects will NOT die when it gets cold (some dragonflies will have migrated south).
Dragon flies and damselflies are very different from each other. Here is a good example of a dragonfly now whizzing around here; it’s apparently a male white-faced meadowhawk dragonfly (Sympetrum obtrusum), which was a little longer than an inch:
Below is a good example of one of our damselflies, apparently a female violet dancer damselfly (Argia fumipennis violacea), which was about an inch long:
Note that dragonflies, when they rest, almost always hold their wings out separately to the side like fixed-wing aircraft and their relatively massive eyes are wrap-arounds. Damselflies, on the other hand, almost always fold their wings up daintily together when they rest and their even more relatively massive eyes are separated on each side of the head, making them one of our most “bug-eyed” or “goggled” insects.
(Images taken in Brooklin, Maine, on August 12 and 13, 2026.)