Back in July 2003, a female dragonfly hovered motionless above the still waters of a pond, dipping its abdomen beneath the water and laying an egg upon a piece of pond weed.

This was the moment of birth for the Emperor dragonfly, Britain's largest dragonfly and one of the easiest to identify.

After a few weeks, the egg hatched and a robust dragonfly nymph emerged.

At this stage, the larva had a banded pattern across its body.

This enables the older dragonfly larva to identify them and hence prevent cannibalism because the Emperor dragonfly larva is extremely ferocious, even eating prey many times its size.

To help with this, the larva is armed with large pincers upon its head that can be thrust out rapidly to seize its prey.

Through the winter of 2003/04, the larva remained dormant, emerging in the spring and continuing to feed and grow until the coming of this past winter.

At this stage, the larva will have been large enough to feed on all forms of tadpoles and even smaller fish are not safe.

Once again, the larva will rest throughout winter months but this time it would be getting ready to emerge.

About this time of year the Emperor dragonfly larva will haul itself out of its pool, clamber up a reed and shed its larva skin for the last time. What emerges is a beautiful adult Emperor dragonfly.

At first, its wings will be crumpled but after a couple of hours the dragonfly will have inflated these by pumping blood through the tiny veins warming them up ready for its first flight.

This is a most fantastic sight and hopefully you will be able to witness it this year.

Your best chance within the district will be to pay a visit to one of Wyre Forest district's beautiful parks or nature reserves.

Springfield and Broadwaters parks are places where these dragonfly along with others, can commonly be seen.

You will be able to tell the sex of the adult with the male Emperor having a emerald green thorax to their body and extremely startling bright blue abdomen, while the female has a much duller coloured abdomen.

The Emperor dragonfly is a fantastic flyer, darting back and forth across the pools and clearings in the wood, where it defends its territory looking for females.

When successful they will perform an aerial courtship, which will lead to their life cycle starting again.