Bug Encyclopedia
Search and identify bugs & insects — beetles, butterflies, moths, ants, bees, spiders and more — with size, habitat, danger, behavior, and how to tell them apart.
Eastern Lubber Grasshopper
One of the largest grasshoppers in North America, the eastern lubber is a slow, flightless giant clad in bold black, yellow, and red that announces its presence rather than hiding from it.
grasshopper-cricket
Emperor Moth
A striking silk moth with a large eyespot on each of its four wings, showing pronounced differences between the smaller, orange-brown, day-flying males and the larger, greyer, night-flying females.
moth
Brown Marmorated Stink Bug
An invasive, mottled brown stink bug identified by alternating light and dark bands on its antennae and abdomen edges, well known for gathering in large numbers on and inside buildings each fall.
true-bug
Eastern Tailed-Blue
A tiny gossamer-wing butterfly with a delicate thread-like tail on each hindwing and a small orange spot near the tail base, common in open weedy habitats throughout the eastern half of North America.
butterfly
Deer Tick
A small, dark-legged tick with a reddish-brown, teardrop-shaped body, noticeably smaller than many other common tick species and often found questing in wooded or grassy edge habitats.
arachnid
Katydid
A leaf-mimicking insect with broad, veined green wings shaped remarkably like foliage, best known for the loud, rhythmic 'katy-did, katy-didn't' chorus males produce on warm summer nights.
grasshopper-cricket
Drinker Moth
A stout, furry moth with warm tawny-orange to buff-brown wings marked by two small white spots on each forewing, named for its caterpillar's habit of drinking water droplets from grass blades.
moth
Old Lady Moth
A large, dusky brown noctuid moth with an intricate, wood-grain-like pattern of dark streaks and pale flecks across broad wings, often found resting motionless in sheds and against tree bark by day.
moth
White Ermine Moth
A soft, fuzzy white moth speckled with small black dots, resembling the ermine fur trim after which it is named, commonly seen resting on vegetation or attracted to lights on summer nights.
moth
Monarch Butterfly
A large butterfly with bold orange wings crossed by black veins and a black, white-spotted border, famous for its multi-generational migration between North America and central Mexico.
butterfly
Cottonwood Borer
A large, boldly patterned longhorn beetle in black and chalky white checkerboard markings, often found clinging to the trunks of cottonwood and poplar trees near its larvae's root tunnels.
beetle
Angle Shades Moth
A common night-flying moth whose forewings fold into a crumpled, tent-like shape that mimics a withered or damaged leaf, marked with bold olive-green and pinkish-brown zigzag bands.
moth
Tailless Whip Scorpion
A flattened, spider-like arachnid with no stinger and no fangs, instead using a pair of long whip-like sensory legs and grasping spiny arms to feel out and seize prey in total darkness.
arachnid
Purseweb Spider
A secretive, tube-dwelling spider that spends nearly its entire life hidden inside a silk-lined burrow extension camouflaged with soil and debris on the surface.
spider
Orb Weaver Spider
A stout-bodied spider best known for spinning the classic, near-perfect circular "orb" web strung between plants, eaves, or fences, often rebuilt fresh each night.
spider
Cutworm
A plump, dull gray-brown caterpillar that hides in soil by day and emerges at night to sever young seedlings at the base, curling tightly into a C-shape when disturbed.
caterpillar-larva
Barn Spider
A brownish, mottled orb weaver famous as the inspiration for Charlotte's Web, commonly found spinning large nightly webs on barns, porches, and other structures.
spider
Water Cricket
Despite its name, the water cricket is not a cricket at all but a compact, velvety true bug that skates over the swirling surfaces of streams and riffles in search of trapped prey.
true-bug
Broad-Bodied Chaser
A stout, flat-bodied dragonfly that is often the first to colonise a new garden pond, with males showing a powdery pale blue abdomen and females a warm golden-brown one.
dragonfly
Regal Jumping Spider
One of the largest and most striking North American jumping spiders, with a velvety black body, bold markings, and huge iridescent green or blue-lined eyes.
spider
Eastern Hercules Beetle
One of the largest beetles in North America, a massive rhinoceros beetle in which males bear an enormous forked horn used to wrestle rivals off of favored tree sap sites.
beetle
Bumblebee Carpenter Bee
A large, robust bee that closely resembles a bumblebee at a glance but has a smooth, shiny, hairless abdomen and a habit of boring round nesting tunnels into bare wood.
bee
Longhorn Bee
A fuzzy, medium-sized solitary bee named for the males' notably long, curved antennae, commonly seen foraging on sunflowers, asters, and other late-summer composite flowers.
bee
Scorpionfly
A harmless scavenger whose alarming name comes from the male's swollen, upturned abdominal tip, which curls like a scorpion's tail but carries no sting.
other