Pear tree and Beyond: Dragons in the Garden !!!

I spent the morning walking around Rainham RSPB in the hope that more Dragonflies would be on show, it's usually very good for Dragonflies and Damsels, but once again, not much on show despite some good weather conditions.
Perhaps I'm losing my touch, but all I could find was a few Blue Tailed Damselflies, one Common Darter, and one Black Tailed Skimmer.

So feeling slightly disappointed it was back home for some afternoon gardening, as I sat down with a cup of tea contemplating the afternoon jobs, a large Dragonfly flew down to the pond briefly and then flew around the garden, another Migrant Hawker was my first thought, I have had two previous visits by this species the last two years.

Unbelievably, it flew past me very slowly and landed on a hanging basket next to me. I could see that this dragonfly did not look quite right for a Migrant Hawker, the 'frons' on the head was very yellow, the two so called 'headlights' on the top of the thorax were pretty obvious, three blue coloured bands at the end of the abdomen could be seen, a Southern Hawker or Blue Hawker new dragonfly for the garden and only the second time that I have seen this species, luckily I always keep the camera to hand.
The Southern Hawker was not bothered by my presence or my panic to get some record photographs and remained on the hanging basket for at least ten minutes or so.

Immature Male Southern Hawker

While I was watching the Southern Hawker another Dragonfly caught my eye as it flew briefly around the garden, a Brown Hawker, it didn't stay long but another good sighting for the garden.

Another day, and another new Dragonfly for the garden list, a female Common Darter was flying around the pond, it landed on one of the dead wood branches I had placed over the pond, just for this purpose, and I was feeling really pleased that it had been sucessful.