New records of the rare dragonfly, Black Pennant – Selysiothemis nigra (Vander Linden, 1825) (Insecta: Odonata) in Bosnia and Herzeg ovina

. In 2012, we recorded a Black Pennant, Selysiothemis nigra , at two sites in Bosnia and Herzegovina, i


Introduction
Bosnia and Herzegovina is a western Balkan country, situated between Croatia in the west and Serbia and Montenegro in the east.Like its name indicates, it consists of two regions, the northern part called Bosnia and the southern part called Herzegovina.It is a mountainous country, with the large part of the country occupied by the Dinaric Mountain chain.The southern part, Herzegovina, is under a strong influence of the Mediterranean Sea, which can be seen particularly in the faunal composition of this region regarding different animal groups (e.g.butterflies (Lelo 2007)).
While the first data on the dragonfly fauna of Bosnia and Herzegovina were published more than 100 years ago (Petrović et al. 1891), the dragonfly fauna of Bosnia and Herzegovina is still insufficiently known.In the past few decades, limited odonatological attention has been devoted to the country, due to war circumstances.Several minefields still persist, which do not enable systematic surveys to be carried out in the country.
In the last overview of dragonflies of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Jović et al. 2010), 57 species were recorded, 6 of them for the first time ever.Jović et al. 2010 also predicted that ten additional species would be recorded in the near future, due to the known distribution range in the surrounding countries.This proved to be true for the two additional species recorded recently for the country: Anax parthenope (Selys, 1839) (Sućeska & Karačić 2011) and Coenagrion hastulatum (Charpentier, 1825) (Bedjanič 2011).Still, Bosnia and Herzegovina remains one of the least studied countries in terms of dragonfly distribution and number of records (Jović et al. 2010).

Material and methods
We visited the Bosnian part of Neretva River on two occasions, 8.7.2012 and 6.8.2012.Additionally, the data collected from three localities in Croatia between 4.-7.7.2012 are also included.Dragonflies were collected with the butterfly net and released on the same spot.The specimens' determination was done using Dijkstra & Lewington (2006).
Localities in which the species was recorded:

Results and discussion
In the first locality, a single dragonfly species, Black Pennant, Selysiothemis nigra (Vander Linden, 1825), was recorded.Two females were collected in dry grassy area near the village.The meadows in which they were recorded are surrounded by a small river and ponds, which represent an ideal habitat for this species (Dijkstra & Lewington 2006).The same species was again recorded in the area of Hutovo Blato Nature Park, some 3 kilometres southeast from the first locality.The habitat there consisted of swamps, path edges and maquis.Both male and female S. nigra were flying around in great numbers, and occasionally resting on bushes and branches.More than 20 specimens were observed in a half hour period.Such high number of observed specimens indicates that the population of this species in this locality is numerous, and the habitat favourable.
This species is distributed mainly in Central Asia and in the Middle East, with scarce distribution in the Mediterranean.It is active from May, until August or September (Dijkstra & Lewington 2006).Few additional species were recorded in the locality of Hutovo Blato, and are listed here to improve the knowledge of dragonflies of Bosnia and Herzegovina: Sympetrum fonscolombi (Selys, 1840), Orthetrum coerulescens (Fabricius, 1798), Crocothemis erythraea (Brullé, 1832) and Ischnura elegans (Vander Linden, 1820).
After the review of all recent data of dragonflies of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Jović et al. 2010, Bedjanič 2011, Sućeska & Karačić 2011), we concluded that no published records exist for S. nigra for Bosnia and Herzegovina.However, it was given to our attention that some specimens of this species are stored in the Zemaljski muzej of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo and that the paper with existing records of this species had already been submitted for publication (Kulijer et al. in press).And while our records are not the first records for the country, they are important as they represent first recent records of this species in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
According to Jović et al. (2010), its occurrence in the Mediterranean part of the country was expected due to the records made in Croatia (Belančić et al. 2008) and Montenegro (Jović et al. 2008).In Croatia, it was also recorded across the Neretva River (Bogdanović et al. 2008), so this record only fits into the known range from Croatia toward the Bosnian part of the river.Our recent observations from the Neretva river (Fig. 1) confirm that this species is present as well as very numerous and widespread in the Croatian part of the Neretva.Further surveys of the Bosnian part of the Neretva River and surrounding localities will probably reveal more localities for this species.With the records of this species, the dragonfly fauna of Bosnia and Herzegovina consists of 60 species.

Figure 1 .
Figure 1.Map of the Neretva River with the marked records of S. nigra in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia.Slika 1. Zemljevid reke Neretve z označeno najdbo S. nigra v Bosni in Hercegovini in na Hrvaškem.