Duckweed firetail
The duckweed firetail is a small, slim damselfly from the United States. The male is bright red, like a tiny flying flame. It loves quiet ponds covered with a green carpet of little floating plants.
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Fun facts
The male has eyes that are red on top and yellow underneath.
The female looks quite different. She is brown and tan instead of red.
Its babies, called nymphs, hide in mats of floating plants. Just before a nymph climbs out, you can see the red tail of the grown-up through its skin.
It seems to like ponds where there are not many eastern pondhawks, bigger dragonflies that may eat it.
In North Carolina it is slowly spreading from the coast further inland.
Most asked questions about Duckweed firetail
?Is the duckweed firetail dangerous?
No. It is a small damselfly that cannot sting or bite you.
?Where does the duckweed firetail live?
In the United States, mostly in the south-east, at swampy ponds covered with duckweed and other floating plants.
?How big is a duckweed firetail?
It is small, about 2.5 to 3 cm long.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Telebasis byersi
- Group
- Dragonflies and damselflies
- Family
- Coenagrionidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Odonata > Coenagrionidae
- Lives on
- North America
Where the facts come from
- Duckweed firetail (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 Eric Haley from Winter Park, Florida, USA. CC BY 2.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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