Field Guide

The cobra clubtail is in the family of dragonflies called clubtails, named for the enlarged abdomen tip. There are about 100 species in this dragonfly family in North America north of Mexico.

The calico pennant is a colorful, beautifully marked dragonfly. Males have pink wing veins and females have yellow. Males have a row of bright reddish heart-shapes on the abdomen; females have yellow.

The Halloween pennant is one of the more common members of its genus. Distinctive wing markings include a complete brown band (not just a spot) positioned just short of the wing tip.

Blue dasher males and females look quite different. Both have a white face, a black abdomen tip, and slanted black and yellow stripes on the thorax. But males are blue and females are striped black and yellow.

The black saddlebags is a dragonfly with memorable markings. Two dark blotches on each hindwing look like saddlebags.

The female black giant ichneumon wasp deposits her eggs through wood. The larvae eat the grubs of wood-boring insects.

The female long-tailed giant ichneumon wasp deposits her eggs through wood. The larvae eat the grubs of the pigeon tremex, a wood-boring horntail wasp.

The locust borer is a longhorned beetle whose larvae tunnel into the trunks of black locust. The colorful black and yellow adults are often seen in late summer as they feed on the pollen of goldenrod and other flowers.

About six species of bird grasshoppers occur in Missouri. Most are attractively marked, large insects that gracefully fly from danger, almost like birds.

The European hornet is a large, nonnative hornet that was introduced to New York in the mid-1800s. They now occur across most of the eastern United States, including Missouri. People may misidentify them as the highly publicized, so-called murder hornets.