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.
Sand Wasp
A fast, sun-loving solitary wasp with large green or grayish eyes and yellow-striped markings that digs burrows in loose sand and provisions them almost entirely with flies.
wasp
Cellar Spider
A pale, long-legged spider that builds loose, irregular webs in dark corners and is famous for rapidly vibrating in its web when disturbed, causing it to blur into an indistinct shape.
spider
Fire Ant
A small reddish-brown ant that builds loose, crater-less dirt mounds in sunny open turf and mobilizes large numbers of workers rapidly when the nest is disturbed.
ant
Mining Bee
A furry, solitary ground-nesting bee that emerges in early spring in loose aggregations, often mistaken for a small bumble bee, digging individual burrows marked by small volcano-shaped mounds of soil.
bee
Whirligig Beetle
A small, glossy black beetle that spins and darts in rapid circles across the surface film of ponds, often gathered in loose groups, using divided eyes to see both above and below the water at once.
aquatic-insect
Plume Moth
A slender, long-legged moth that rests with its wings rolled tightly and held out at right angles to its body, forming a distinctive letter-T silhouette.
moth
Dog-Day Cicada
A stout, thick-bodied cicada with mottled green and brown camouflage patterning, named for its loud droning calls heard during the hot "dog days" of late summer.
true-bug
Drain Fly
A tiny, fuzzy gray-tan fly with broad, moth-like wings held tent-fashion over its body, often seen resting motionless on bathroom walls near drains.
fly
Dragonfly
A large, agile aerial predator with an elongated body, enormous compound eyes, and two pairs of strong wings held straight out to the sides at rest, often seen patrolling over water in search of prey.
dragonfly
Fruit Fly (Mediterranean)
A small but strikingly patterned fly with mottled, banded wings held out to the sides in a fan and a body dotted with silvery spots, best known for larvae that tunnel through ripening fruit. Native to sub-Saharan Africa, it has spread with human trade to become one of the most widely recognized fruit-infesting insects in the world.
fly