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.
Milkweed Leaf Beetle
A large, boldly colored leaf beetle in glossy orange-red with irregular black patches, found feeding exclusively on milkweed plants alongside monarch caterpillars.
beetle
Tortoise Beetle
A small, flat, disc-shaped beetle whose expanded wing covers and pronotum hide its head and legs almost entirely, giving it the look of a miniature turtle shell crawling across a leaf.
beetle
Diving Beetle Larva (Water Tiger)
Nicknamed the water tiger, the larva of a predaceous diving beetle is an elongated, sickle-jawed hunter that stalks the shallows and seizes prey many times its own size.
beetle
Mayfly Nymph
A short-lived aquatic grazer with feathery gills along its abdomen, living for months underwater before a brief, spectacular mass emergence as a winged adult.
aquatic-insect
Javanese Leaf Insect
A broad, veined, leaf-green body makes this insect nearly indistinguishable from the foliage it feeds on, a masterclass in disguise native to the forests of Southeast Asia.
mantis-stick
Fishing Spider
One of the largest spiders in North America, the fishing spider can walk on water, dive beneath the surface to escape danger, and ambush small fish and tadpoles with its front legs from the water's edge.
spider
Northern Walkingstick
A slender, wingless insect so convincingly shaped like a twig that it can rest motionless on a branch just inches from view and go completely unnoticed.
mantis-stick
Painted Grasshopper
A large, boldly striped grasshopper of South Asia whose vivid green, yellow, and black pattern warns predators that it has fed on toxic milkweed plants.
grasshopper-cricket
Rocky Mountain Locust
Once the most destructive insect in North American history, this swarming grasshopper vanished within a few decades of forming the largest insect swarm ever recorded.
grasshopper-cricket
Tarantula
The tarantula is the heavyweight of the spider world, a densely furred, ground-hugging hunter that spends most of its long life waiting in a silk-lined burrow for prey to wander past.
spider
Giant Mayfly
Known for emerging by the billions in summer swarms so dense they can show up on weather radar, the Giant Mayfly is one of the largest and most abundant mayflies in North America.
aquatic-insect
Common Spreadwing
True to its family name, the Common Spreadwing perches with its wings held out at an angle rather than folded together, setting it apart from most other damselflies.
dragonfly
Roseate Skimmer
A vivid pink-violet dragonfly of southern wetlands, the mature male's rose-pruinose body makes it one of the most striking skimmers found around ponds and canals.
dragonfly
Water Beetle
A smooth, dark, oval-bodied beetle adapted for swimming, commonly found paddling through ponds and marshes and periodically surfacing to renew a carried air supply.
aquatic-insect
Dance Fly
A slender, long-legged predatory fly named for the swarming courtship dances males perform at dusk, often while carrying a captured insect as an offering.
fly
Flesh Fly
A bristly gray fly marked with three dark thoracic stripes and a checkerboard-patterned abdomen, often spotted hovering near carrion or garbage.
fly
Chinese Mantis
One of the largest praying mantises found in North America, an introduced species with a lean brown-and-green body and grasping spined forelegs built for ambushing insect prey.
mantis-stick
Dung Fly
A hairy, often golden-hued fly commonly seen perched on fresh manure in pastures, where it hunts smaller insects as an adult while its larvae develop within the dung itself.
fly
Spur-throated Grasshopper
One of the most familiar grasshopper groups in North America, named for the small spine on its throat and known for including some of the continent's most abundant rangeland species.
grasshopper-cricket
Two-striped Grasshopper
Easily spotted by the pair of pale cream stripes running the length of its body, the two-striped grasshopper is one of the largest and most economically important grasshoppers in North America.
grasshopper-cricket
Lubber Grasshopper
Heavy-bodied and slow-moving, lubber grasshoppers make up for their poor flying ability with large size, bold coloring, and a lumbering, ground-bound lifestyle.
grasshopper-cricket
Grasshopper
A robust, strong-jumping insect with short antennae and powerful hind legs, commonly seen springing away through grass and low vegetation on warm sunny days.
grasshopper-cricket
Giant Swallowtail
The largest butterfly in North America, a dark brown giant marked with a bold diagonal yellow band and yellow spotting that forms an X-like pattern when the wings are spread.
butterfly
Spicebush Swallowtail Caterpillar
A bulging-eyed green caterpillar that lives folded inside its own silk-stitched leaf tent, looking every bit like a miniature snake peering out from cover.
caterpillar-larva