Dragonfly Days -- Widow Skimmer

Dragonflies are wondrous creatures. Starting out in ponds and wetlands as aquatic beings, they look like little tanks hunting for mosquito larva, beetles, or an occasional tadpole.

They may take a couple of years to metamorphosis into an adult; leaving their childhood skin hanging on a blade of grass at pond's edge.

As adults they also hunt those pesky mosquitoes; sometimes the dragonfly will follow a human down a trail, grabbing and munching the critters the human scares up.

The dragonfly in the picture is a Widow Skimmer. The yellow and brown color of the body means that it has just metamorphosed; later its body will turn a blueish, chalky, white. The white spots on its wings indicated that this is a male; females lack the spots.

Sources and more info: Wikipedia; BugGuide.net