Common whitetail
The common whitetail is a dragonfly with a chunky white body and dark bands on its clear wings, which give it a checked look. Only the grown-up males have the white body. The females are brown with a different pattern of spots on their wings.
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Fun facts
The male's white colour is a kind of powder. He shows it off to warn other males to keep away.
Each male guards his own stretch of shore, 10 to 30 metres long, and chases other males away.
Its young are usually covered in green algae, which helps them hide under water.
Fish, frogs and birds love to eat its young, because there are so many of them.
Females like to lay their eggs in the middle of the day.
Most asked questions about Common whitetail
?Why does the common whitetail have a white tail?
Only grown-up males have it. They show the white to other males to say this is my place.
?What does the common whitetail eat?
It eats mosquitoes and other small flying insects.
?Where can I see a common whitetail?
Near ponds, marshes and slow rivers across most of North America.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Plathemis lydia
- Group
- Dragonflies and damselflies
- Family
- Libellulidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Odonata > Libellulidae
- Lives on
- North America
- Also known as
- Long-tailed skimmer
Where the facts come from
- Common whitetail (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Bruce Marlin. CC BY-SA 2.5, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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