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.
Aphid
A tiny, soft-bodied, pear-shaped insect that clusters in dense colonies on plant stems and leaf undersides, feeding on sap through needle-like mouthparts and often coated in sweet honeydew.
true-bug
Sleepy Orange
A small, deep orange sulphur butterfly with dark wing borders and a low, wandering flight, named for a faint dark mark that suggests a half-closed, sleepy eye.
butterfly
Orange Sulphur
A vivid orange-and-yellow butterfly with sharp black wing borders, one of the most common butterflies over open fields and alfalfa crops throughout North America.
butterfly
Little Yellow
A tiny, pale lemon-yellow butterfly with a thin, crisp black wing border, fluttering close to the ground in fields and roadsides across the southern and eastern United States.
butterfly
Clouded Sulphur
A medium-sized pale yellow butterfly with crisp black wing borders, commonly seen fluttering low over clover fields and roadside meadows across North America.
butterfly
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
Fiery Skipper
A small, fast, orange-and-black skipper often seen zipping low over lawns and gardens, with jagged black wing borders that resemble scorched edges.
butterfly
Furniture Beetle
A tiny, reddish-brown to dark brown cylindrical beetle whose larvae, commonly called 'woodworm,' bore small round tunnels through seasoned furniture and timber.
beetle
Death Watch Beetle
A mottled brown wood-boring beetle famous for the faint ticking sound it taps out inside old timbers, once thought by superstitious listeners to be an omen of death.
beetle
Snout Beetle
A small beetle instantly recognized by its elongated, downward-curving snout, tipped with chewing mouthparts, used to bore into seeds, nuts, stems, or fruit.
beetleSmall Tortoiseshell
A vivid orange-red European garden butterfly patterned with black and yellow blocks and a border of blue crescents, one of the most familiar and widely recognized butterflies across its range.
butterfly
Weevil
A beetle instantly recognizable by its elongated, downward-curving snout tipped with tiny chewing mouthparts, used to bore into seeds, nuts, grain, and plant stems.
beetleOnion Fly
A slender gray fly closely related to houseflies whose white legless larvae bore into onion bulbs, feeding in clusters within a single rotting bulb.
fly
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
Mourning Cloak
A dark, velvety maroon-brown butterfly edged with a ragged cream-yellow border and a row of iridescent blue spots, notable for overwintering as an adult and often being one of the very first butterflies seen flying in early spring.
butterfly
Roesel's Bush Cricket
Marked with a pale cream border along its thorax, this compact bush cricket produces a continuous, high-pitched, buzzing song reminiscent of an electrical hum from dense summer grass.
grasshopper-cricket
Mourning Cloak Butterfly
A deep maroon-brown butterfly bordered with a cream-yellow band and a row of iridescent blue spots, unusual among butterflies for overwintering as an adult and being one of the first to appear in early spring.
butterfly
Promethea Moth
A medium-sized silk moth showing striking differences between the sexes, with dark, blackish-maroon males that mimic a distasteful swallowtail butterfly in flight and larger, more colorful reddish-brown females marked with pale borders and eyespots.
moth
Bollworm
One of the most economically significant caterpillars in North American agriculture, the bollworm changes color from green to brown to pink across its life and bores into cotton bolls, corn ears, and tomato fruit alike.
caterpillar-larvaAsian Longhorned Beetle
A large, glossy black longhorn beetle patterned with irregular white spots and boldly banded blue-white antennae, notable as one of the largest and most eye-catching wood-boring beetles seen in temperate hardwood trees.
beetle