Being one of the larger groups of micropneumonopteres, javelinflies are agile aerial predators that mostly hunt other micropneumonopteres in flight; sometimes, they will also snatch up small animals off the ground or plants and bigger species can attack small species of macropneumonopteres. All three eyes are tilted forward, giving them a field of trinocular vision that allows them to precisely snach their prey with their enlarged front feet, which is then killed by the pair of protruding lip teeth that gave them their name. While the teeth are used to administer venom in most species and the saw-like offset teeth on the underside of the lips enable them to cut their prey into pieces quickly, the more primitive, nonvenomous forms will use their teeth to repeatedly stab the prey while some aberrant forms will inject digestive fluids with the venom and drink the dissolved tissue through their tooth pair like a straw while resting. Some other forms prefer to search for prey on foot or feed on vermiphytes, either as parasites or pollinators.

Since javelinflies are solitary and not above cannibalizing conspecifics, the courtship is a finicky process, where the male has to perform an elaborate dance to make himself recognizeable as a partner. Many of the courtship rituals end prematurely, as the males will flee as soon as they feel even slightly threatened by their larger but less agile partner. The young start out as ground dwellers, feeding on small animals or vermiphyte larvae, with some species being adapted to feeding on stonemoss or stonemold before maturing.

The group is widespread across both the Western and the Northern Continent, but never quite managed to colonize the latter's Eastern part, where lancers, an unrelated micropneumonoptere group with very similar ecology, have taken their role.





Greater armour piercer: A robust species that mostly lives and hunts on the ground, specialized on small terrestrial tentaculopods. The front teeth are short and robust, made to wedge apart their pres'y exoskeletal segments. Due to their lifestyle, the pads of their front feet are reduced and resemble those from the rest of their feet.

Blossom robber: This nonvenomous species is a cleptoparasite of vermiphytes with long or convoluted gonophores with specialized pollinators. Rather than bothering with evolving the right mouthparts to feed from the gonophores, blossom robbers will pierce them from the sides and feed on the exudates through their especially long teeth and extendable lips. They are generally found in tropical to subtropical areas of the Western Continent, where "flowering" vermiphytes are available around the year.

