Dragonflies over a slow bend of the Ganga and damselflies threading the vegetation at a stream edge are recorded together in one official number for Rajaji: 38 species. That figure comes from the Zoological Survey of India's Fauna of Conservation Area 5: Rajaji National Park of March 1995 — a historical inventory of what was collected and identified before publication, not a current census. This page sets out what the volume's Odonata chapter says, who wrote it, where the material came from, how dragonflies and damselflies are divided within the total, and what the number does not mean for a visitor now.
Sources checked on 2 November 2026: the Zoological Survey of India's own copy of Fauna of Conservation Area 5: Rajaji National Park (March 1995, 323 pp.), read as a scanned PDF; and this site's own published pages, linked at the foot of this article.
The chapter
The Odonata chapter is by M. Prasad and Asket Singh and runs from page 195 to page 215. It reports 38 species belonging to 23 genera and 8 families, and it is explicit about its basis: the study rests on the Odonata collections available at the Northern Regional Station of the Zoological Survey of India at Dehradun, supplemented by the earlier literature the chapter lists — Fraser's surveys, Bhasin, Singh and Baijal, Sahni, Atkinson, and the Prasad and Singh series on the Doon Valley and its surroundings. The volume's own summary prints the same figure among its totals — 38 odonates, set beside 49 mammals, 168 birds, 28 snakes, 12 turtles and tortoises, 9 lizards, 10 toads and frogs, 49 fishes, 7 centipedes, 21 termites, 68 butterflies and 14 hymenoptera. Here chapter and summary agree, which is worth noting because the same volume does not always provide it: the full summary list is set out in the companion butterfly article. Every figure in that block is a historical inventory total, not a count of what lives in the park today.
Dragonflies and damselflies are not one thing
Odonata is the order; it contains two suborders that a reader should keep apart. Dragonflies are Anisoptera — usually stouter-bodied, holding the wings spread flat or slightly lowered at rest, and strong, tireless flyers over open water. Damselflies are Zygoptera — slimmer, typically folding the wings back along the body when perched, and often found closer to vegetation at the water's edge. The ZSI chapter treats the park's Odonata as a single subject and covers both suborders, so the 38 species is a combined figure for dragonflies and damselflies together rather than 38 of one kind.
The chapter's own numbered list makes the division visible. It opens with a Zygoptera block running from species 1 to species 16 — six families: Platystictidae, Platycnemididae, Coenagrionidae, Lestidae, Chlorocyphidae and Calopterygidae. It then turns to an Anisoptera block running from species 17 to species 38, two families only: Gomphidae and Libellulidae, the latter carrying the larger share with 19 of the 38 species. Counted from that list, the split is 16 damselfly species and 22 dragonfly species. It should be labelled honestly: the chapter prints the list and the two suborder headings, but it does not print those two subtotals, so they are a reading of its list rather than a quoted pair of numbers.
No full species list appears on this page. The chapter gives all 38 by name, and a partial transcription assembled from a scan would be worse than none: readers who want the names should open the volume and read pages 195 to 215. What can be said safely is the shape of the fauna — eight families, a handful of damselfly families and two dragonfly families — and that the chapter's key and species accounts are there for anyone who needs them.
What the chapter prints about the park
The introduction gives the park's coordinates as latitude 29°51' to 30°15' North and longitude 77°52' to 78°22' East, and describes the setting in two short sentences: the forest is deciduous, with sal (Shorea robusta) as the major plantation, and the Ganga with its tributaries — Song, Suswa and Rawason among them — passes through the park near Rishikesh and emerges downstream near Haridwar. Those are the chapter's own words, and this page quotes them at that level only. No habitat preference, no breeding site, no flight season and no abundance is attributed to any species here, because none of those claims was read out of the chapter. Ecology that is not on the page does not get invented to fill the space around it.
One caution about the geography: the chapter places the park in Dehradun, Pauri Garhwal and Saharanpur districts as the older district arrangement had it, while the butterfly chapter in the same volume gives Dehradun, Haridwar and Pauri. Both are period statements about an arrangement that changed when Haridwar became a district, and neither is a description of the park's boundaries today.
A 1995 record, not a present count
Three dates matter. The collections were curated at a regional station whose surveys ran for years before the book. The volume was published in March 1995. The final national park notification came on 14 September 2013, and the tiger reserve was declared in 2015. The 1995 book therefore predates the notified boundary in force now, and it describes the park as it was defined at the time of the surveys. This page keeps all of that attached to the number: 38 species recorded in a 1995 inventory, and nothing more.
What this page will not claim
There is no current odonate list for Rajaji on this site, and none was located as of 2 November 2026. This page does not say Rajaji "has 38 dragonflies today", does not say the species are common, scarce, widespread or declining, and gives no flight seasons, no best months for watching and no abundance language of any kind. What it states is narrower and firmer: a March 1995 official volume records 38 odonate species in 23 genera and 8 families for the park, from material curated at ZSI's Northern Regional Station in Dehradun, under a chapter by M. Prasad and Asket Singh at pages 195 to 215.
Where to read next
Odonates are watched over water, so start with the rivers and waterholes guide, which covers the Ganga, its tributaries and the dry-season concentration points. The birdwatching guide matters too: dragonflies are part of what birders track over water, and the same volume counts 168 bird species for the park. For the wider fauna, the animals list. For a wetland with its own published inventory of its own, Asan Conservation Reserve — a separate site in Dehradun district, in the Yamuna basin, not part of Rajaji and never described as its wetland. The two companion chapters of the same volume are the butterfly record and the fish record. Sources checked 2 November 2026.
Rajaji's 1995 ZSI dragonfly and damselfly record: questions answered
How many dragonfly and damselfly species are recorded for Rajaji?
38 species, in 23 genera and 8 families, from the Odonata chapter by M. Prasad and Asket Singh at pages 195 to 215 of the Zoological Survey of India's March 1995 volume. The volume's own summary lists the same 38 odonates. These are figures from a historical inventory, not a current count, and this page claims no present-day total.
What is the difference between a dragonfly and a damselflie?
Dragonflies are the suborder Anisoptera: typically broader-bodied, holding their wings spread flat or slightly lowered at rest, and strong flyers over open water. Damselflies are the suborder Zygoptera: slimmer, usually folding the wings back along the body when perched, and often found closer to vegetation at the water's edge. The ZSI chapter covers both suborders, so its 38 species is the combined figure for the park.
Are dragonflies and damselflies counted separately in the chapter?
Yes, in the sense that the chapter's numbered list runs 16 damselfly species under the Zygoptera heading and then 22 dragonfly species under the Anisoptera heading — six damselfly families and two dragonfly families, 8 families in all. That split is counted from the chapter's own list rather than printed by it as a pair of subtotals, so it is given here as a reading of the list, not as a quoted figure.
Where did the material come from, and what does the chapter say about the park?
The study is based on the Odonata collections available at the Northern Regional Station of the Zoological Survey of India at Dehradun. The chapter also prints the park's coordinates — latitude 29°51' to 30°15' N and longitude 77°52' to 78°22' E — and describes the forest as deciduous with sal (Shorea robusta) as the major plantation, with the Ganga and its tributaries Song, Suswa and Rawason passing through. Those descriptions are quoted as printed and are not extended into any wider ecological claim.
Is there a current odonate list for Rajaji on this site?
No, and none was located as of 2 November 2026. The 1995 inventory is a historical record of what was collected and identified before publication. This page gives no abundance, no population trend, no flight season and no best month for watching, because none of those was read out of the source. For Rajaji's water, the rivers and waterholes guide; for birds, the birdwatching guide; for the wider fauna, the animals list; and for a separate wetland with its own published inventory, Asan Conservation Reserve.