Ray Bruun

1) When did you start actively looking/pursuing Odes?

     Summer 2001

2) What's your main County(s) for searching?

     Shasta

3) What's your favorite site in your County?

     Don't have a favorite.

4) Which Ode got you started?

     Widow Skimmer.  Photographed a male on June 19, 2001.  Sent picture to the lady with the dragonfly web site.  She identified it for me.  That was it.  Kept photographing from then on.

5) How many species have you seen in California?

     91

6) What are your goal(s) in looking for Odes?

     Eventually travel to other parts of the country (e.g., New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, in the short term).

7) If you'd like to include a short bio on your odeing experience or a funny story.

   Once I went birding with some friends and brought a net along in case we came across some odes.  A male Blue-eyed Darner flew by and I thought, "Great, a beautiful   dragonfly I can show them."  I swung the net skillfully and caught it! . . . or the front half of it at least. The abdomen fell to the ground.  Not a good way to introduce environmentalist birder type friends to the hobby of odeing.