Spangled Skimmer: Day Brook Pond, Kennebunk Plains Conservancy, Kennebunk, Maine, USA, July 2026 — Another favorite dragonfly—but mostly because of how it looks in flight. Imagine those little bright spots on the wrist of the wing—if dragonfly wings had bones, which they do not—in motion, describing arks and figure 8s as the wings more as only dragonfly wings can move. Boneless, the wings respond to both the complex muscles at their bases which control tilt and camber and speed, and dynamically to the currents of air they are navigating. And you can see this dance if you watch the patterns the spots on the Spangled Skimmer’s wings make. Spangled comes, of course, from that glittering dance. We have a female (brownish) and a male (bluish) here. Sony a6700. Sigma 16-300 Contemporary. Program with insect modifications. Processed in Photomator.