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Austroargiolestes amabilis (Forster, 1899)
FLAME FLATWING
Family Argiolestidae
This brilliant damselfly was high on my to find list. I noticed on the Atlas of Living Australia website that some specimens had been collected in Dorrigo in 1911!
Having been on the main walking tracks in the Dorrigo National Park near Waterfall Way many times and only once seeing a damselfly – not a Flame Flatwing , I decided to try the Rosewood Creek track near the Never Never picnic area. On the last day of November 2014, I found a companion to walk the 6.5km loop track. There was only one spot near the Coachwood Falls where you could easily access Rosewood Creek.
I noticed a dragonfly – I thought – on some leaves on the other side of the creek. As I crept closer I could see the brilliant orange markings of an Austroargiolestes amabilis, the Flame Flatwing!
There were 2 females near the creek and we saw a couple more females further along the track where gullies met the track. In one place, I saw a Flame Flatwing – possibly a male – fly near a perched female. She reacted by sticking her abdomen vertically up in the air and waving it while the other Flame Flatwing flew off before I could get a good look at it.
Over the next 5 years I visited this site once or twice annually to look for a male Flame Flatwingto photograph. On the 10th of january 2019, I not only found a co-operative male but also saw a female Flame Flatwing laying eggs on moss-covered wet rock under a rock overhang at the edge of the Rosewood river near the Coachwood Falls
