I have seen several photos of Meadowhawks on this site, including the one you linked to, which have been identified to species based solely on the photo. All the literature I have read indicates that S. internum, S. rubicundulum, S. janae (not even mentioned on this site), and S. obtrusum (except for mature males) are so similar that they must be identified under a microscope. Is there some new field mark or new method of ID that I haven't heard of yet?

We presume there is some way to tell them apart, but it may be a microscope! Our common Sympetrum here is rubicundulum, so it looks like rubicundulum to us. Don't know what we should do about the immature images in the guide. We think that question has come up before but don't remember the decision. It might be best to include the information on the guide page. Thanks for that reminder.

Until someone (not me!!) does a guide page illustrating details of hamules and subgenital plates for Sympetrum, maybe we could have a section of the Guide for "Sympetrum sp." or "Kalosympetrum sp." or "S. rubicundulum complex" or something like that, for specimens that can't really be ID'ed by photo. How does BugGuide sort photos of other taxa that are not identifiable to species by photo?

How about opening up a Taxonomy forum and presenting your idea there, referencing this image?

So is this not Sympetrum rubicundulum? If it isn't I added one of these images to that page. Let me know and I will remove it.

Thanks.

But to my knowledge (and I'm not an expert), there is no way of assigning a species name to this photograph, unless the photographer had examined the animal under magnification. It could very well be that none of the rubicundulum on the guide page are rubicundulum. I just don't know.

By the way, is there a resident odonate expert on this site?