Distribution patterns of dragonflies (Odonata) in Central Asia

Spring immigration of dragonflies (Odonata) in Tajikistan

“…In autumn, the descendants of immigrants migrate back to the south. This is confirmed by observations on ornithological traps at the Chokpak Pass in South Kazakhstan [Borisov, 2009[Borisov, , 2010[Borisov, , 2015. Thus, these dragonflies live in Central Asia only during the warm period of the year, and their larvae are unable to hibernate here due to the temperature preferences.…”

“…flavescens [Corbet, 1999;Borisov, 2012b;May, 2013] and S. fonscolombii [Lempert, 1997;Borisov, 2011b;Ikemeyer et al, 2015] have clear preferences in development on ephemeral ponds. These species are common inhabitants of rice paddies in Tajikistan and, in general, Central Asia [Borisov, 2015]. Apparently, A. ephippiger has the same preferences in the choice of habitats for larvae [Dumont, Desmet, 1990;Borisov, 2011a].…”

“…Moreover, autumn migrations are well-studied, but little is known about spring migrations from the south to the north. Spring flights are barely noticeable and any directional movements of dragonflies (swarms or hordes) have never been visually noted [Russel et al, 1998;Corbet, 1999;May, Mattews, 2008;May, 2013;Borisov, 2015]. Only the use of radar in Bohai Sea of northeastern China made it possible to track down mass spring-summer migrations of Pantala flavescens (Fabricius, 1798) to the north [Feng et al, 2006].…”

“…In Central Asia, four species of dragonflies are known for seasonal latitudinal migrations: Anax ephippiger (Burmeister, 1839), A. parthenope (Selys, 1839), P. flavescens and Sympetrum fonscolombii (Selys, 1840) [Borisov, 2015]. All these species have the extensive ranges covering different natural-climatic zones.…”

“…There are cohorts with different annual cycles in populations of this species, one of which migrates and the other one remains residential [May, Mattews, 2008;May, 2013May, , 2019. In this case, it is especially difficult to determine the spring immigration of dragonflies, because both aboriginal individuals and immigrants from the south can exist simultaneously in the same locality [Borisov, 2012a[Borisov, , 2015.…”