What is a dragonfly?
Dragonflies are insects, belonging to the Class Insecta (also called Hexapoda). This class is part of a larger group, the Phylum Arthropoda. The arthropods are characterized by the presence of an exoskeleton, a segmented body, and jointed appendages. The members of the Class Insecta (insects) have all the features of arthropods but can be further characterized by the presence of three distinct body segments: the head, thorax, and abdomen. The head has one pair of antennae and the thorax has six legs, one pair for each of its own three segments. The abdomen has no true legs and may have as many as ten or eleven segments. The class is organized into orders, where the insects appear in recognizable groups. The dragonflies (and damselflies) belong to the Order Odonata (the toothed ones). Dragonflies belong to the Suborder Anisoptera and the damselflies to the Suborder Zygoptera. The suborders are further divided into families and then to the actual scientific name of a specific dragonfly.
