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Giant Dragonfly
Petalura gigantea
A spectacular insect from an ancient family!
Conservation Status
Endangered species in New South Wales (Threatened Species Conservation Act).
What does it look like?
The Giant Dragonfly is one of the largest dragonflies found in Australia. It is one of the last remaining members of an ancient family of insects called the Petaluridae. The wingspan of the male dragonfly is up to 12 centimetres wide!
You can recognise the Giant Dragonfly by looking for this broad wingspan, combined with widely separated eyes, with a brown-black pattern on its abdomen with regular yellow markings.
Where does the Giant Dragonfly live?
Most dragonfly species like to be near water. The Giant Dragonfly is no exception, as its habitat is boggy seepages and swamps. However, although they are large, adult dragonflies are poor flyers and it is believed that the Giant Dragonfly is largely terrestrial for most of its life.
Sadly, the drastic loss of wetland habitat has meant that sightings of the Giant Dragonfly are now very rare. The adults are spectacular and highly visible, and the scarcity of recent records is likely showing a real decline in the distribution of this species. The largest known extant population of the species occurs in patches of sphagnum swamp within Wingecarribee Swamp near Moss Vale.
What does it eat?
The Giant Dragonfly feeds exclusively on a range of insects and spiders.
What is its life cycle?
One amazing characteristic of the Giant Dragonfly is its unusually long larval stage . Instead of living in water like typical dragonfly species, the larval grubs live in permanent long burrows built in the soil of wetland areas.
Each burrow has an opening above the water level, and they come out in wet weather and at night to feed on insects and other arthropods. While they like water, they can't swim and they avoid open water.
It's hard to believe, but the larvae will continue this life from between 10 years to up to 30 years before transforming into an adult dragonfly!
Once their metamorphosis is complete, adult dragonflies emerge in October and November. They have about 3 months to mate and lay their eggs before dying. Surprisingly, because they are poor flyers, the adult dragonflies do not fly far from their breeding grounds after hatching.
What are the threats to its survival?
The Giant Dragonfly depends on wetlands to survive. The major threats to its survival are:
- Loss of wetland habitat
- The degradation of existing wetland habitat
What can we do to protect it?
The most important things we can do to preserve the Giant Dragonfly are:
- Protect and conserve our remaining wetlands
- Make sure that existing wetlands aren't polluted or degraded in other ways
- Protect waterways that feed into wetlands
- Educate people about this amazing insect
Updated: 06 Dec 2011
Related Links
- Giant Dragonfly - Threatened Species Profile