Bedjanic. M, Conniff. K & deSilva Wijeyeratne. G, (2007). Dragonflies of Sri Lanka. Eco Holidays, Colombo. 248 pages. ISBN 978-955-1079-15-4.
A 248 page, A6 sized book, with colour plates for 91 of the 118 species of Dragonflies in Sri Lanka. Attractively designed and easy to use, it is the first of its kind in Sri Lanka. Easy to read English makes it ideal for the novice dragonfly watcher.
The book has been split into nine sections to enable easy download.
The Indian subcontinent is one of the biologically richest regions of the world. Two global biodiversity hot spots, namely the eastern Himalayas and the Western Ghats, are in this region. Another biologically rich region, Sri Lanka, is just to the south of the subcontinent. The subcontinent is rich in odonates (damselflies and dragonflies); about 500 species are known. The dragonflies of the region are taxonomically well described thanks to the monumental work of Fraser. However, the natural history and distribution of most of the species is barely known. This lacuna is largely due to the lack of user-friendly field guides for amateur naturalists and students.
As an initiative to generate interest in dragonflies among naturalists and students, Indian Academy of Sciences has published a field guide on the odonates of Peninsular India. The book is being published as part of Project Lifescape of the Academy. This project aims at producing user-friendly field guides and other resources to encourage field-based biology research among students.
The book is divided into three parts. The first part gives a detailed account of the natural history of Odonata. The second part gives keys for the identification of odonate families for larval and adult stages. The third section gives species accounts for 26 damselflies and 34 dragonflies of Peninsular India. The book is lavishly illustrated with colour photographs or specimen scans of all the species described. In addition, the book also provides a checklist of odonates for the region (178 species) and a glossary of technical terms. The novelty of the book is provision of common English names of all species. The first edition of this book is entirely downloadable freely in PDF from from this website:
<http://www.ias.ac.in/initiat/sci_ed/lifescape/odonates.html>
"The Dragonflies of Sri Lanka" by Terrence de Fonseka
2000 Published by WHT Publications (Private) Limited, 95 Cotta Road, Colombo 8, Sri Lanka
IBSN 955-9114-19-0
Hardcover book 302 pages, 20 colour plates
This is an excellent compilation of information about the dragonflies of Sri Lanka. It is largely a collection of information from other, mostly out-of-print sources, that summarizes what is known about Sri Lankan dragonflies. As well as the colour plates of adults, there are also black and white line drawings of most species. Both adults and larvae are described. There is an extensive list of cited literature.
"Dragonflies of Peninsular Malaysia and Singapore"
by A. G. Orr
A pocket guide of the 230 species of that region. Clear identification keys with an illustration for all species.
Title: "Dragonflies of Taiwan: 120 species"
This pocket book is a photographic guide of adult dragonflies presently occurring in Taiwan. It covers almost 97.5% of all those can be seen in the wild. For those who are interested, please contact: wbst@wbst.org.tw
This information will be posted on the website: www.wbst.org.tw in the near future (presently unavailable).
The cover of this book can be seen in the following link: http://nature.kl.edu.tw/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18766
This book is 128 pages with more than 360 color photos with up to date scientific names and status. It costs only 150TWD (4.72USD)!!
Book: "Dragonflies of Taiwan"
Liang-Jong Wang
Both English and Chinese texts. Extremly complete (a lot of species and pictures). We like it so much that we regret the too short English texts.
Book: Wilson, K.D.P. (2003). "Field Guide to the Dragonflies of Hong Kong", Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department, Hong Kong, 381 pp. ISBN 988-201-614-6. HK$80. Softcover.
Comprehensive field guide to adults of all 110 dragonfly species currently known from Hong Kong, including checklist, extensive keys, biometrics and numerous colour photographs.
URL: http://odonata-malaysia.blogspot.com/ A very interesting blog on the odonata of Peninsular Malaysia. The author regularly updates his blog with new posts of species - in all stages: larvae, emergences and adults - as he finds them.
URL: A simply arranged cluster of pages with more than 500 photos of Odonata in Nature made by Oleg Kosterin (Novosibirsk, Russia). They are taken mostly in Siberia (which is also Asia!!!) but quite a unbrer of those also in S Korea, Japan , Germany, France and Thailand. The latter 'abroad' photos are on average most better in quality as scanned and processed later. This cluster is a part of the page which also contains photos of other insects, plants and landscapes, predominantly Siberian.
The Odonata of Sulu, Philippines,
travel and adventures to discover the Philippine Odonata (Negros, Luzon, Mindanao, Samar, Sulu) with plenty pictures of species, biotops and landscapes.
(written in german)
URL: Bugs of Thailand, including a selection of John Moore's photos of Thai Dragonflies and Damselflies.
Have a look on the "Hear Them" page for playing sounds of Circadas and Crickets.