Everyday miracles continue......

For the last few days we have noticed quite a few large dragonfly exuviea on the vegetation surrounding the pond at work, I was quite intrigued, but assumed they were from the Southern hawker dragonflies we had seen round the pond last year.
Well, when I arrived this morning one had just hatched and was sitting on a reed and it wasn't a Southern hawker but a really exciting male Emperor dragonfly Anax imperator. 
We watched him all day, as he slowly dried his wings, and sat around waiting for the sun to come out so he could fly off...sadly the sun decided to remain hidden and it started to rain heavily so I moved him onto the overhanging willow tree where he could hide from the rain under the leaves. As you can see from my main blip he did get a bit damp, but when I left him he was drying off nicely and later the sun did finally come out for an hour or so.
I have included a shot of him earlier in the day drying his wings, and one other of him hiding from me behind a twig!
I am so delighted to have been able to spend time with this beautiful creature today what a privilege!