Dragonfly Visits Brooklyn Beach Shop, Coney Island Boardwalk. July 16, 2013. Photo © Maya Haddad Miller/Brooklyn Beach Shop
“We don’t know anything about what the dragonflies do when they get in the vicinity of the city,” says Michael L. May, a professor of entomology at Rutgers University in an article in the New Yorker. Now we do, they like to shop for beach gear in Coney Island.
On Tuesday, we received an email from Maya Haddad Miller of Brooklyn Beach Shop on the Coney Island Boardwalk: “Is this an annual thing? Hundreds of dragonflies show up around the same time each year? When I arrived this morning, it looked like over a hundred of them were swarming the boardwalk. I had a few in the shop from the night before. They fly in and out all day. I had a about five in the shop at the same time. I’m thinking its cause of the heat.”
Is Coney Island on the dragonflies’ migratory path or are they simply coming out to the beach to beat the heat like everyone else? A web search turned up a tweet from last year around this time that said, “Omg Coney Island is swamped with dragonflies – Williamsburg Night at the Cyclones game…” And also led us to Backyard and Beyond’s lovely photos of “Weekend Dragonflies” in Brooklyn Bridge Park two days ago. It’s definitely dragonfly time in Brooklyn
Related Posts on ATZ…
June 17, 2013: Photo of the Day: Paquito the Chihuahua in Coney Island
May 21, 2013: Photo of the Day: Pretty the Coney Island Cat
May 8, 2013: Traveler: The Cats of Rimini’s Italia in Miniatura Park
April 1, 2013: Sea Rabbits Swim Ashore in Coney Island, Up For Adoption
Amusing the Zillion 
That’s a Blue Dasher, a male. Some of this species are indeed migratory, moving up and down the Atlantic coast. Look for them again in the fall, along with Black and Carolina saddlebags, Wandering Gliders, Common Darners, and the other migratory species. Interestingly, they travel along the shorelines with the prevailing seasonal winds, like hawks. Some raptors like the American Kestrel are in fact big predators of dragonflies.
Thanks for the insight! I’m used to see migrating monarch butterflies later in the year, but hadn’t been aware of swarms of dragonflies before
I’ve only experienced the reverse run, on Rockaway peninsula in the middle of September, dragonfly after dragonfly flying past the late boardwalk.
Did you manage to get any good photos? I found some videos on YouTube of Dragonfly Migration and Dragonfly Swarm. Not NYC though…
My husband died that year. That was the day of his funeral. I remember very well the dragonflies came by my windows I had to run to close them and then followed us all the way to the rides we took our kids that day. When we stopped by the bar to buy kids slushies the dragonflies landed around the bar. All people started saying what the … every year ever since I see a dragonfly around this time. This year it landed on me as well. According to Chinese belief I’ve read it’s a sign of transformation. If only we knew…