Journal of Threatened Taxa | www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 July 2014 | 6(8): 6127–6137 Note A preliminary checklist of odonates in of the Indian subcontinent gave a Kerala Agricultural University (KAU) detailed account of the odonates campus, Thrissur District, Kerala, of Kerala also. The odonate fauna of Kerala is well documented, some southern India ISSN of the prominent works include Online 0974–7907 Print 0974–7893 C.K. Adarsh 1, K.S. Aneesh 2 & P.O. Nameer 3 Peters (1981), Rao & Lahiri (1982), Prasad (1987), Mathavan & Miller OPEN ACCESS 1, 3 Centre for Wildlife Sciences, College of Forestry, Kerala Agricultural (1989), Radhakrishnan (1997), University, Thrissur, Kerala 680656, India Emiliyamma & Radhakrishnan (2000, 2002), Palot et 2 Department of Forestry and Wood Technology, Sir Syed College, Taliparamba, Kannur, Kerala 670142, India al. (2002), Subramanian & Sivaramakrishnan (2002), 1
[email protected], 2
[email protected], Radhakrishnan & Emiliyamma (2003), Emiliyamma et al. 3
[email protected] (corresponding author) (2005), Subramanian (2005, 2007), Kiran & Raju (2011, 2013) which provided information regarding the status and distribution of odonates in different parts of Kerala. Study area: The Kerala Agricultural University (KAU) The order Odonata, which comprise of dragonflies and main campus is located at Vellanikkara, Thrissur District, damselflies are one of the fascinating groups of insects. Kerala (Fig. 1). The area lies between 10032’–10033’N Because of their amphibious life history, relatively short and 76016’–76017’E, with an average altitude of 50m. generation time, high trophic position, and diversity, KAU campus is located very close to the Peechi-Vazhani odonates are considered as an important component Wildlife Sanctuary, Western Ghats, the aerial distance of of freshwater ecosystems as well as good indicators of which is not more than 5km.