Insect and Spider Identification: CLOSED: What on earth is this?, 0 by Valthero

Valthero wrote:
I saw this thing hanging on the screen of my kitchen window. I caught it using the tried-and-true cup-and-paper method, and I have never seen anything like it before.

Apologies for the poor image quality. The side shown is the underside, I cannot for the life of me get a decent shot of its back.

It has the wingspan of an American quarter-dollar coin.
It's difficult for me to say how many legs it has. My eyesight is poor up close, and it seems to have one or two "spines" of a sort on most of its legs, which can easily be seen in the picture attached. However, the two "frontal" legs don't seem to have any of these sort of spines.
Its wings look almost feathery, and seem to have a curved hook at the end of each, just behind the tips of the wings.
I cannot tell if it has a stinger, or mandibles, or a proboscis, or anything else that it might use to fight or feed. My father speculates that it's some sort of "water insect," such as a dragonfly or mosquito. (We have a small pond in our backyard)

So...any ideas?


EDIT: Here's a slightly larger image. http://puu.sh/3rfe9.png

This message was edited Jun 29, 2013 2:30 PM

This message was edited Jun 29, 2013 2:30 PM