Columbia Clubtail (Gomphurus lynnae) male with pruinosity, cheesing for the camera, Lower Crab Creek, Grant County, Washington. June 2025. Photo: Jim Burns.
September 2025 DSA Species of the Month:
Columbia Clubtail (Gomphurus lynnae)
Our September DSA Species of the Month is the Columbia Clubtail (Gomphurus lynnae) in the family Gomphidae, known as the Clubtails. According to Dennis Paulson’s Dragonflies and Damselflies of the West, it is approximately 54-60 mm long (approximately two to just under two-and-a-half inches), and is found in “good-sized sandy to muddy rivers in open shrub steppe, or bordered by riparian woodland.” Limited distribution in the Northwest United States. According to the Washington Department of Fish & Wildlife, it was first sighted in 1971, and is the most recently described dragonfly in the Pacific Northwest (1983). Older name is Gomphus lynnae. Join photographer Jim Burns as he sets out on a quest for this elusive species.
My wife, Deva, and I escaped Covid-19 unscathed, its largest impact on me being the curtailing of my quixotic attempt to photograph 400 North American odonates. We were more fortunate than many during the Pandemic. We did not travel out of our home state of Arizona for three years, and my ode identification skills and my enthusiasm for the chase greatly waned until this year.
So it was this past June that my quest was renewed on a visit to the Pacific Northwest. My main goals were visiting friends and finally photographing the Columbia Clubtail (Gomphurus lynnae), a dragon that had eluded me on three previous occasions when we had looked for it in late May, too early for its flight season. Columbia Clubtail, uncommon and known primarily from only the Yakima River in Washington and the John Day and Malheur Rivers in Oregon, is unique in being the only clubtail that develops pruinosity.
Thanks to specific site information helpfully supplied by odonate expert Dennis Paulson, who first discovered and described this species in1971, we encountered flyby males moving too fast for the camera along the John Day River at J. S. Burres State Park in Gilliam County, Oregon. The next day we found males and females perched along the banks of Crab Creek in Grant County, Washington. This latter site, despite the beautiful, flowing creek itself was, literally, a dumping ground. This habitat got me to thinking about the reasons why some odonate species might develop pruinosity.
Columbia Clubtail (Gomphurus lynnae) female with pruinosity, Lower Crab Creek, Grant County, Washington. June 2025. Photo: Jim Burns.
Pruinosity, the powdery whitish bloom that exudes from cuticle on some odes, is thought to develop for three possible reasons: It reflects UV rays, thereby helping in thermoregulation; it may contribute in some way to species communication or territorial defense; it might also signal males’ readiness for mating. But I left Crab Creek thinking about another possible purpose: camouflage. Many female odes seem to have evolved to blend into their habitat background. Why not males of a species that perches on the ground in an arid environment?
Columbia Clubtail (Gomphurus lynnae) male obelisking, Lower Crab Creek, Grant County, Washington, June 2025. Photo: Jim Burns
Crab Creek lies within the rain shadow of the Cascades in dry, shrub-steppe habitat. The soil along its banks is cracked and sunbaked, nearly white in many areas. By the time we arrived at the site at mid-morning under blue skies, it took my eyes several minutes to adjust to the terrible glare. It took longer still to clearly focus binoculars and camera on odes resting on the bright ground cover. Adding to the issue at this site was the trash that had been dumped along the banks of the creek: abandoned, white enamel home appliances, discarded faded clothing, and bleached timber.
The Columbia Clubtails were pruinose all right! The males more so than the females. The idea of pruinosity as camouflage didn’t fully strike me until I noticed (after missing it at first) a male perched almost at my feet on a ragged white pillowcase. Of course this large, strikingly marked yellow and black dragon doesn’t just live around dumps, but all of the dozen or so I photographed at this site were resting in the open on light colored rocks, sandy, bright tire tracks, or human trash.
Columbia Clubtail (Gomphurus lynnae) male perched on pillowcase, Lower Crab Creek, Grant County, Washington. June 2025. Photo: Jim Burns.
The jarring juxtaposition of finally photographing a beautiful, long sought clubtail amidst human trash left me with mixed emotions. It also left me still three short of my original goal. I have three snaketails to find to add to my photo album. Here’s hoping one of them, along a pristine, remote creek in a cool, sun-dappled forest, will complete my fifteen year quest, and reward my renewed enthusiasm, post-Pandemic, for dragonflies.
Jim Burns on his photography quest to photograph 400 North American Odonates, Scottsdale, Arizona. Undated photo. Photo by Deva Burns.
Jim Burns is an outdoor writer/photographer based in Scottsdale, Arizona. He fell into odonata fifteen years ago by chance when he got bored waiting for Common Black Hawks to return to their nestlings with prey and photographed a nearby male Roseate Skimmer dragonfly, having no idea what it was. As often happens, one thing led to another and he became totally hooked on dragons and damsels.
