The large red damselfly (Pyrrhosoma nymphula) is a species of damselflies belonging to the family Coenagrionidae. It is native to the western Palearctic.
Distribution
This species is a mainly European damselfly, with some populations in Northern Africa and Western Asia.
Habitat
These damselflies inhabit small ponds, lakes and dikes, and occasionally slow-moving rivers. They tend to avoid fast flowing water. These large and robust damselflies show black legs and wing spots in both sexes. Wings are hyaline, with a blackish pterostigma. Mature females occur in three colour forms (typical, fulvipes and melanotum), from mostly black to mostly red, but all have yellow bands around the abdominal segments.
These damselflies can easily be confused with small red damselflies, but the latter has orange legs, while the large red damselfly has black legs. In Greece and Albania a closely related species occurs, the Greek red damsel (Pyrrhosoma elisabethae). They look very much the same, the females only having a slightly different pronotum with deep folds in the hind margin. The males differ in their lower appendages, which are longer than the upper ones, while the black hook on the lower appendages is half as long as in the large red damselfly. The appendages of the large red damselfly can be seen in the gallery below.
Biology and behaviour
The great red damselfly is often the first damselfly to emerge, usually in April or May. Adults can be found until September, according to locality.