More details about our project

We are mapping smoky rubyspot (Hetaerina titia) wing coloration across its range.  Smoky rubyspots vary widely in wing coloration, with some individuals having fully black hindwings while other individuals having only brownish-red wingspots at the base of their wings.

We know that this coloration varies seasonally in parts of its range, with light individuals emerging in early spring and darker individuals predominating during the summer. However, much of the diversity in wing coloration across the range of smoky rubyspots remains unknown.

That’s where iNaturalist comes in! We are hoping that citizen scientists can help us fill in gaps in our understanding of how wing coloration varies in time (e.g., by visiting a stream with smoky rubyspots a couple of times each year) and in space.

When submitting photos, please include the location and date of the photograph. If you are submitting multiple photographs, please indicate whether there are repeated photographs of the same individual or whether you are submitting multiple different individuals. Finally, any information on the number of smoky rubyspots that you saw where you took the photo would be very helpful.

This research is funded by the National Science Foundation (DEB Award #1457844) and UCLA. For more information, or to get in touch, visit rubyspot.org.

Four Tips for Photographing Damselflies:

(1) Photograph the damselfly's wings perpendicular to the camera. This way, the entire wing surface is visible in the photo. For example, this:





Is better than this:





(2) Get as close as possible to the damselfly. Being closer to the subject yields a better photograph, but be aware that they may flee from humans if they are too close.


(3) Photograph the damselflies in front of a light background, so that their wings contrast with the background.


(4) When possible, photograph the damselflies in the sun. If the subject is in the shade, you may need to increase your ISO (800-1600+ should do the trick), or decrease your aperture (f8-f12 is fine).  Make sure that your shutter speed is greater than 1/60 at the very minimum, but 1/200 or above is best. Using the flash is also an option, however use caution when deploying the flash, as the flash often catches on surrounding foliage and may cause the subject to appear dark.  

Posted on August 3, 2017 10:30 PM by smokyrubyspot