The African skimmer (Anax ephippiger) is a conspicuous migrant, which typically measures 61 to 70 mm in length, and the wingspan is about 9.5 cm. Adult males have brown eyes that on the underside blend into a greenish-yellow. The ventral part of its thorax is greenish yellow, while the sides of the thorax are brown. It has a slender pinkish-brown abdomen with a pronounced black stripe along the mid-dorsal side. The male has a blue second segment of the abdomen, but since the 'saddle' sits right behind the wings, which is also typical for the blue-tailed companion (Anax parthenope), we must be cautious when considering this feature for identification.
Females and young males are more uniformly sandy brown in color, and for them the 'saddle' is not as distinctly blue.
The African skimmer is a migratory species that reaches our region together with air currents from its tropical homeland, but it is not known whether it overwinters here. In any case, after the spring invasion from eggs laid by newcomers here, larvae develop and from them the adult animals emerge.
It is a species of shallow and warm lakes and ponds, i.e., bodies of water that often dry up.
In our country, adult individuals of the African skimmer hatch in the summer and fly from July to September. We can expect newcomers when a warm cyclone approaches from over the Mediterranean, i.e., under favorable weather conditions for migration.
