The birds will often cycle through a set of nearby perches; at least, I've seen kingbirds and phoebes do that. Predicting which perch and pre-focusing is not trivial, but can be done. It's developing the patience I find most challenging. (There's a phoebe at an island in the Canada Domain pond at the Metro Zoo I have yet to manage a clear shot of, despite 3 years of attempts, for example.)

But I agree that dragonflies are much more regular.