Johan van der Wielen ~ Nature Photography

Since last year, I have been working on a project in my own garden. We created a natural pond, and I have been following all developments ever since. In 2025, I followed the emergence of the emperor dragonfly. Over a few nights following the first truly warm days, about 15 dragonflies emerged. I followed this again this year, and by now, more than 20 have emerged. The emergence of this dragonfly, one of the largest in our country, starts after sunset. Then the larvae look for a stem to crawl up. Within the first few hours, they transform from a brown larva into a fully-fledged dragonfly. Most fly away towards the trees during the night, but some hang there waiting for warmth until dawn. Then they begin to move their wings, and after a few minutes, they are gone. I have now followed this breathtaking process for the second year during the past 5 nights with both photos and video. Although there are still many photos to take, I think that after two years I now have enough material to share. I hope to be able to finish editing the short film shortly.flies.