Notes on a small dragonfly collection from China

Between the 5th and 22nd July 1976 I visited the Peoples’ Republic of China as a member of a New Zealand student delegation. The party visited Canton (Guangzhou). Nanchang. Hangchow. Shangai and Peking (Beijing), Because of the circumstances of the trip dragonllies were collected only in Hangchow and Canton. A general account of the trip has been given in R.J. ROWE (1979, Weia 3 I: 1-2). In central Peking crepuscular dragonflies were common on the avenue leading to Tien An Men Square and immediately in front of the Tien An Men Gate. Both an aeshnid (possibly Aeshna) and a libclIulid (possibly Pantala flavescens) emerged in the early evening and started to hawk among the trees just as the swifts ( (Apodidae) sought roosting sites. Local children attempted to catch these dragonflies while they were roosting during the day, by tapping them on the back with a blob of sticky earth at the end of a long bamboo pole. The children I watched had no success with the roosting dragonflies but did catch a number of cicadas. A local guide told me that her two children sometimes caught up to twenty dragonflies in a day this way, the live animals were brought home and liberated to fly about the flat.