Atrocalopteryx auco Hamalainen, 2014

The species is described this year (2014) by Matti Hamalainen despite of the fact that we have seen it flying in nature since 2008.

In the field trip to Huu Lien, Lang Son Province, North Vietnam with the species author for finding Echo maxina, I saw that species in a source of the stream that I collected the species Nihonogomphus schorri. This is the third undescribed species be known to science in trips of Echo maxima, in Huu Lien, Lang Son (see the topic Trips of finding Echo maxima Martin, 1904, mystery of mysteries).

It is interesting that this unknown species be in Matti's collection quite long time but it only be focused since a fellow (Sebastien Delonglee) sent the author its photos from Huu Lien in 2013. In my photo gallery, I keep the photos in two separated folders: males in A. atrocyana and the female in A. coomani folders. I remember that I did take photos of the species among bamboos near the deep and clear stream that runs directly from limestone mountain. 

Matti Hamalainen as being informing the photos from Sebastien then found that it belong a distinguish species that difference from all known species then he described the species under the name: A. auco. He wrote in the etymological part of the description: "The species epithet auco is named after Âu Cơ, a character in the Vietnamese mythology. Âu Cơ was a young, beautiful mountain fairy who fell in love with Lạc Long Quân (the Dragon Lord of Lac). They married and she gave birth to an egg sac from which hatched a hundred children known collectively as the Bach Viet, the ancestors of the Vietnamese people. Âu Cơ is widely honoured as the mother of Vietnamese civilization." 

Before deciding the name of the species, Matti emailed to me about his idea of the name of the species and I did full agree with his very interesting idea, the colorful wings of this group matches very well to Âu Cơ, who is a pretty girl and she is well known to any Vietnamese people and this will make the species to be more familial to Vietnamese.

Male of A. auco (on a bamboo leaf above) photographed by Cuong Do, same date to the holotype in Huu Lien, Lang Son Province

Female of A. auco (among bamboos) with white pseudo-pterostigma that make I misidentified it to be A. coomani, photographed by Cuong Do, same date to the holotype in Huu Lien, Lang Son Province

Noguchiphaea yoshikoae Asahina, 1976

Asahina (1976) described a new calopterygid genus Noguchiphaea based on two male specimens of N. yoshikoae Asahina, 1976 from Doi Inthanon in Chiang Mai Province in the northern part of Thailand. Subsequently Asahina (1981) described the female of this species, which was collected in the same area - Doi Suthep in Chiang Mai - as the type, and provided additional characters for the genus. In a third paper, Asahina (1985) described further characters of both sexes and considered N. yoshikoae as endemic to Thailand.

Recently, the species has been found in north of Vietnam, Tam Dao National Park and Xuan Son National Park. This is a small-medium sized damselfly; the head and body are metallic green with cream-yellow patches on lower synthorax. As well as it of the female, the male prothorax has distinct structure dorsal posterior lobe. The inferior anal appendages are undeveloped in the male. The wings are hyaline with apical fade spot and both fore and hind wings are petiolate at very base. They fly in the end of rain season in good forests of high mountains and do not live far from the breeding sites. They are weak flying insects and usually perch on vegetations near clean running water.

Male, photographed by Cuong Do, Tam Dao National Park

Female, photographed by Cuong Do, Tam Dao National Park

Neurobasis chinensis (Linnaeus, 1758)

This is quite common Asian species and is one of the earliest known species of dragonfly. It was named by Linnae based on a picture in book cover of bird. And because in the picture the specimen was drawn with the wings in horizontal position, this species formerly was put in Anisoptera suborder by Linnae. Name of species is specified its locality, from China.

The medium sized damselfly, this species has shining green body and hind-wing is metallic green. The head, thorax and abdomen of the male are metallic green while female has fader green body. The wings of the male distinguish from them of the female. Female’s fore-wing has a white spot at pterosigma position – psedopterostigma, while male’s fore-wings are dust yellowish hyaline and instead of psedopterostigma, there is a white spot at nodus position. The hind-wings of female are shinning colorful, metallic green with an apical black patch on upper side and they are quite dust yellowish hyaline in female.

They are very active damselflies, and live at open swift streams from low to high lands. They never fly far from their breeding habitat; males are strict in territorial defense by showing their flash metallic green hind-wings. Males fly very close to the water surface while females usually perch on vegetations nearby. In courtship flying, males usually keep the hind-wing open in horizontal position to show the flash green upper surface of the wings under sunshine. Sometime males just clap their hind-wings as resting and the action is signal to other males in territorial informing or to coming females for mating. Females insert their eggs into aqua vegetation tissue; in many cases, female sinks in the water during the oviposition while the male around.

Male, photographed by Cuong Do, Ba Vi

Male, photographed by Cuong Do, Pioac Nature Reserve, Cao Bang Province

Male, showing his hind wing in opened position, photographed by Cuong Do, Hon Ba Nature Reserve, Khanh Hoa Province

Atrocalopteryx laosica Fraser, 1933

Species name is specified the locality of holotype which was recorded from Laos.

                                               

A large size damselfly, the body is shining metallic green. The legs are slim with long spin rows. In the sunlight, the body reflects from metallic red-green to blue-green in colour. Two pairs of wing always fold up above the abdomen; they are red-black and darker than those of Atrocalopteryx coomani. The abdomen is somehow flattened in dorsal-ventral side.

The mature forms fly at opened but clear streams with rich of oxygen on highlands of west-north of Vietnam. The damselflies usually appear from middle to the end of rain season with high humidity. They are not very active insects and often perch on vegetation near the water.

Male, photographed by Cuong Do, Lao Cai

Calopteryx coomani (Fraser, 1935)

This species was described by R. Martin in 1904 base on the specimens collected from Tonkin, Vietnam.

A large size damselfly, it is shining metallic green with two pairs of dark colour wings. The head, thorax and abdomen are green metallic, the legs are delegate and spiny, the middle and hind tibia are curve. The wings are dark, the colour is same in both sides, the wings are not unicolour, and remarkably there is a large basal anal patch hyaline in forewings. The forewings of females have a white spot at pterostigma position and it is called psedopterostigma.

They are live at clean streams in pristine forests on high limestone mountains of North Vietnam. The mature forms fly during the rain season and they live in shade area with high humidity. Occasionally, males perch in the sunlight with the wings folded along the abdomen and show their shining metallic green body. They are not so active and usually fly weakly among branches of vegetations near the breeding sites. 

Male, Tam Dao National Parck, photographed by Cuong Do

Female with the white spot on her wings, Tam Dao National Park, photographed by Cuong Do

Caliphaea confusa Hagen in Selys, 1859

This species was recorded the by Asahina from North Vietnamese forests in 1995. Dumon 2005, analysed the ITS and Ribosome gene area of members of Caloptera and the result showed that genome type of Caliphaea is not close to it of Noguchiphaea as their structure of their wing venation.

It is a small size calopterid damselfly. The synthorax is shining metallic green with yellowish marking, the abdomen is slim and shining metallic green with end segments usually are pruinose on dorsal side. Their wings are hyaline or amber hyaline, slightly petiolate at base and always are folded at rest; the pterostigma is always present.

They are rare species but common locally, live in pristine forests of Limestone Mountains in the North of Vietnam. Both male and female are weak flying and they usually rest on vegetations around their breeding sites. Larvae of the species live in clear, fast running streams with high concentrate of oxygen and covered by vegetation.

Male, photographed by Cuong Do, Hoang Lien National Park, Sa Pa, Lao Cai Province

Archineura hetaerinoides (Fraser, 1933)

The species is a heavy built damselfly, and it is one of the biggest zygopteran. The body is variable from dark green to copper and there are pruinose patches on the synthorax and the abdomen. Their wings are hyaline with smoky patch at base. In the mature forms, the wings somehow to be light orange and look dust. Male and female are not dimorphism so they look similar and female is distinct with her robust abdomen.

They live in open clear and swift streams of secondary forests of high land in the North of the country with elevation over 700m. Mature forms do not fly far from their breeding habitats and the male keeps his territory even in rain. Individuals of both sexes perch not so high above of the water surface, usually they rest on rocks or water plants near the flowing water. 

Male just above the water, photographed by Cuong Do, Lao Cai Province

Devadatta ducatrix Lieftinck, 1969

This species was described by Lieftinck in 1969 based on the holotype collected from Thai Moi, Tonkin (Lang Son Province, North of Vietnam) after he revised R. Martin’s specimen in Paris Museum.

Same to Devadatta cyanocephala, it is a medium-size species, but the colour of body darker and without marking. Whole body species is metallic dark blue or black and uncoloured, The wings are hyaline with particularly apical dark spot, wings always are fold at rest.

Except the distribution, Devadatta ducatrix wide distributed in South East Asia, but it has similar habitat of D. cyanocephala. They usually fly weakly not too far from the streams of their larvae, in shade, humid tropical forests on hight mountains, and some time also found at sun light stream area. 

Male (close wings), photographed by Cuong Do, Ba Vi National Park

Male (opened wings), photographed by Cuong Do, Ba Vi

Female, photographed by Cuong Do, Tam Dao National Park

Atrocalopteryx fasciata Yang, Hamalainen & Zhang, 2014

The new species of very beautiful Caloptera damselfly was found from Yunnan, collected by the first author of the species, be confirmed by second and third author.

The new species is close to its related species Atrocalopteryx laosica that was recorded from Laos and Vietnam. They are easy separated by the differnce of wing color marking, A. laosica has darker wings while A. fasiata has clear part at wing apex and base.

Calopterygidae is one of the most colorful insect group among Odonata order, Matti Hamalainen (third author of the species) is the world expert of this group, Haomiao Zhang (the second author) is young actives odonatologist who interested in many groups of Odonata, he found many new species of Odonata from China.

Atrocalopteryx fasciata, holotype from the original description

Atrocalopteryx laosica, taken by Cuong Do in Sa Pa, Lao Cai Province, North Vietnam (29.VII.2006)