Montana Field Guide

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- Kingdom - Animals - Animalia
  - Phylum - Spiders, Insects, and Crustaceans - Arthropoda
    - Class - Insects - Insecta
      - Order - Dragonflies / Damselflies - Odonata
        
        Family - Petaltail Dragonflies - Petaluridae
        
        Species - Black Petaltail - Tanypteryx hageni

Black Petaltail - Tanypteryx hageni

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Native Species

Global Rank: G4
State Rank: SNR

Agency Status
USFWS:
USFS:
BLM:

External Links

General Description

Black with small yellow spots and widely separated eyes. Female has ovipositor with blades that reach end of abdomen. Larva has evenly tapered 6-segmented antennae. (Needham & Westfall, 1955, Walker, 1958)

Diagnostic Characteristics

Only NA dragonfly with a prominent hairy bump on the underside of the thorax, only western dragonfly with a posteriorly concave stigma. Antennae of larvae are diagnostic, only NA dragonfly that lives in burrows.

Range Comments

Not known from Idaho or Montana (Nature Serve 2007), but was reported from Bozeman, though location is questionable (Miller and Gustafson 1996).

Habitat

Small, trickling springs in boggy areas (Miller and Gustafson 1996).

Food Habits

Larvae feed on a wide variety of aquatic insects, such as mosquito larvae, other aquatic fly larvae, mayfly larvae, and freshwater shrimp. They will also eat very small fish and tadpoles.
Adult- The dragonfly will eat almost any soft-bodied flying insect including mosquitoes, flies, small moths, mayflies, and flying ants or termites.

References

Additional ReferencesLegend: View Online Publication
Do you know of a citation we're missing?
- Dunkle, S.W. 2000. Dragonflies through binoculars: A field guide to dragonflies of North America. New York, NY. Oxford University Press. 266 pp.
- Paulson, D.R. 2009. Dragonflies and Damselflies of the West. Princeton University Press, Princeton. 535 pp.
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Citation for data on this website:
Black Petaltail — Tanypteryx hageni. Montana Field Guide. Montana Natural Heritage Program. Retrieved on May 17, 2024, from https://FieldGuide.mt.gov/speciesDetail.aspx?elcode=IIODO02010