Cannibalism among Odonates
Cannibalism and Odonates
Cannibalism is predation between members of the same species, not between different members of the same Order.
It's something well-known for larvae. But there are very few records, papers or documents about cannibalism between adults or imagos.
For now 4 years I'm trying to build data about this topic : this behaviour is very rare for Anisoptera or, at least, very rarely recorded and documented. I only know 4 cases.
It's better documented for Zygoptera : my data show 26 species involved, with 2 dominant genus : Ischnura and Ceriagrion.
It would be interesting to add more data, more species. To know the triggers of this behaviour, to know if the high density of a population in a location, the rarity of other odonates or of preys are satisfactory explanations.
To know the evolutive stage of both implicated individuals ; teneral, young, mature.
To know why the intra specific recognition is sometimes not done.
Is that only an opportunistic behavior ...more ↓
