Bug Identifier

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.

Cloudless Sulphur

Cloudless Sulphur

A large, bright lemon-yellow butterfly that flies with strong, direct wingbeats and rarely shows any dark markings, giving it an almost uniformly 'cloudless' appearance.

butterfly
Giant Asian Mantis

Giant Asian Mantis

A bulky, leaf-green predator that sits patiently among foliage, its powerful spined forelegs poised to snatch any insect that strays too close.

mantis-stick
Ironclad Beetle

Ironclad Beetle

A slow-moving, mottled gray beetle famed for having one of the hardest, most crush-resistant exoskeletons of any insect, often found clinging motionless to dead wood or tree bark.

beetle
Tsetse Fly

Tsetse Fly

A stout grayish-brown fly of African woodlands whose rigid, forward-jutting proboscis and scissor-folded wings set it apart from any ordinary house fly.

fly
Screech Beetle

Screech Beetle

This small, oval water beetle earns its name from the loud squeak it produces when picked up, a sound made by rubbing internal body parts together rather than by any vocal organ.

beetle
Cone-headed Katydid

Cone-headed Katydid

A large, grass-colored katydid named for its sharply pointed, cone-shaped head, best known for producing some of the loudest, most sustained buzzing calls of any North American insect.

grasshopper-cricket
Twenty-plume Moth

Twenty-plume Moth

A tiny, unusual moth whose wings are each divided into numerous slender, feather-like plumes rather than solid membranes, giving it a delicate, fringed appearance unlike almost any other moth.

moth
Gray Hairstreak

Gray Hairstreak

A small slate-gray butterfly with thin white lines, an orange-capped black spot near the hindwing tail, and one of the broadest host-plant ranges of any North American butterfly, making it a familiar visitor to gardens and fields alike.

butterfly