Singin' HOT HOT HOT!

Holy cow it's been hot outside lately!
It's never too hot to talk about our friend the dragonfly though! 

Even though it's late in the month of July, there's still a bunch of these guys flying around!  Speaking of flying around, these little critters are fabulous fliers!  They can fly forward, backward, and stay in one place (called hovering).  They are one of few insects that can do that! 

So when we drive through a town, usually we have to do 25 miles per hour right?  Well it's a good thing dragonflies don't have to follow the speed limit because they can fly up to 30 miles per hour. 

That's fast!

These guys just keep getting cooler!  In the last post I mentioned that they were like dinosaurs.  Well this critter is one of the few dinosaurs still living!  The scientists believe these fast fliers have been around since before the dinosaurs roamed our giant planet, lived through the dinosaur age, and are still around today!  There is one major change though, when they were hanging out with the dinosaurs, if you would have measured their wings from tip to tip it would have been three feet across!  Can you imagine an insect that big flying around?  It would look like a kite! Imagine how big the mosquitoes must have been! (not sure if they were alive back then but if they were, they must have been huge!)

Many people think when they see two dragonflies flying together they are mating but this isn't always true.  Just like when you put a key in a lock to get into your house the male has a key at the end of his abdomen and the female has a lock right behind her head.  The male will insert the key into the lock and if it doesn't fit, then he knows she isn't the right species.  If it does fit, then they're both the same species and they can proceed to mate. Which is a little more tricky and requires most species to land to perform. 

Notice the male still has his "key" in place and the female reaches her abdomen around to receive his sperm. 

SO, overall these critters are super cool and I hope you guys like them just as much as I do. 
Now I know it's a little warm out today but it's cooler than it has been so go ahead and take it outside today!!  Happy Friday Friends!

Dinosaur Coloring Page: http://stockphotos.s-fun.com/colouring-book-coloring-pages/dinosaur-coloring-pages/dinosaur-coloring-pages-01/

Dragonfly Coloring Page: http://101coloringpages.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/dragonfly-3.gif

Dragonfly Lock and Key Photo: http://s.ngm.com/2006/04/dragonfly-mating/img/mating-flying-615.jpg

Dragonfly Mating photo: http://www.cirrusimage.com/Dragon/Anax_junius_mating_wheel_1024_small.JPG