As the morning sun spreads summer warmth onto meadows and ponds, the fearsome hunters prepare for launch, whirring their membranous wings to warm flight muscles for the day's hunt. Muscles taut, they vault into the air. They are gossamer death, skimming the landscape, their bulbous eyes enabling a panoramic view as they search for the slightest glint of prey. A river cruiser acrobatically flips its streamlined body, swooping to snag a mosquito in mid-flight for an aerial meal. A powdered dancer deftly dives to bring an untimely end to a plump housefly more than half its size.