Near the Crannog at Lakeside, Eleanor Colver, Conservation Officer of the British Dragonfly Society (BDS), will present a plaque and unveil a colourful information board about the life of dragonflies.

A launch event to mark this occasion is being held by the Llangorse Dragonfly Group (LDG), which includes staff and volunteers of the Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales, Biodiversity Information Service, Brecon Beacons National Park, and local community.  This will include pond dipping (11am & 1pm) walks and dragonfly related crafts suitable for the whole family.  There will also be a guided walk around the lake at 2.30pm.

Hotspots are chosen by BDS as places which offer visitors the opportunity to see and learn about dragonflies. Since 2014 the Society has designated seventeen sites. The nearest to Brecknock is at the Shropshire Hills Discovery Centre, Craven Arms.  Future public events are planned at Llangorse Lake in the future.

Llangorse Lake is a great place to see a wide variety of dragons and damsels, sometimes in large numbers. The Nature Trail runs between the car park, cafe, toilets, and boats at Llangorse Lakeside and the small car park below Llangasty Church, a little under two miles.

Starting from Lakeside, the slipway, and the bridge across the Llynfi outlet stream are good places to watch patrolling Migrant and Brown Hawkers in August and September. In late June 2020 and 2021, as well as Black-tailed Skimmers, Mark Waldron found and photographed Scarce Chaser here, a Red Data List species new to mid-Wales.  Banded Demoiselles, which choose running water, are sometimes on the Llynfi in mid-summer.

Across the bridge and through the kissing gate into the second field, the lake sometimes spreads out in a shallow flood. When this happens in summer dragonflies may include Emperor and Broad-bodied and Four-spotted Chasers. In two years, there have been Scarce Blue-tailed Damselflies, a species more often seen at hill pools. There is a wet corner to look at in the next field before the path moves away from the water's edge past two craggy ancient oaks.

The next field, lightly grazed by ponies, has a more or less wet fringe, and then come two lovely hay meadows, with orchids, Ragged Robin and Bird's Foot Trefoil, Common Blue butterflies and Burnet moths. Through the far gate there is a path down to the Bird Hide and a damp field managed by ponies, sheep, cattle, and rooting pigs. This is a particularly good place to see damselflies from mid-May. On sunny days thousands may emerge; at first, they are mainly Variable Damselflies, and then Common Blue which have a longer flight season. Among them are smaller numbers of Blue-tailed, Azure, Large Red and Red-eyed Damselflies. A few Hairy Dragonflies appear in early summer before the other large species - Migrant and Southern Hawkers, Emperor, and Golden-ringed Dragonflies. Migrants are the most numerous and it is possible to see fifty or more from the Trail, with the total around the whole Lake probably in the hundreds.

Through the small wood and the next field, you can approach the reed-fringed edge of the Lake. Again, there are damselflies, and Broad-bodied and Four-spotted Chasers in mid-summer. Ruddy Darters, typically eight males, hold short waterside territories in August. Just before the car park at Llangasty is a patch of open water, a place to look for an Emperor Dragonfly cruising back and forward or hanging in the reeds, or a Black-tailed Skimmer sunning on a rock.

What you see at Llangorse Lake varies through the season from May to October, and dragonflies are much more active and visible on still sunny days. The current species total is twenty-two, with several additions in recent years, some apparently as a result of spread to west and north with climate change. And the Lake is rich in all sorts of other wildlife. I hope you enjoy a Hotspot visit soon.

-Keith Noble, Breconshire Dragonfly Recorder