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.
Tent Caterpillar
A social, blue-striped caterpillar that builds a conspicuous silken tent in the fork of a tree branch, sheltering large colonies of siblings that emerge together to feed on leaves.
caterpillar-larva
Tick
A small, flattened, oval arachnid with a hard shield-like plate on its back that waits on vegetation and attaches to passing hosts to feed on blood, swelling considerably once fed.
arachnidSpotted Camel Cricket
A wingless, humpbacked cricket relative with mottled markings and enormous hind legs, more often found lurking in damp basements and cellars than singing in a meadow.
grasshopper-cricketRat-Tailed Maggot
Named for its long, thin, telescoping breathing tube, the rat-tailed maggot is the aquatic larva of the drone fly, thriving in stagnant, low-oxygen water where few other insects can survive.
aquatic-insect
Question Mark Butterfly
A ragged-edged anglewing butterfly named for the tiny silver question-mark squiggle on its mottled brown underside, with tawny-orange upperwings dotted in black.
butterfly
Poplar Hawk-Moth
A large, grayish-brown hawk-moth with an unusual resting posture in which the hindwings project forward past the forewings, revealing a hidden rust-red patch when disturbed.
moth
Painted Skimmer
The Painted Skimmer's warm amber-and-brown mottled wings look like they were dabbed with a paintbrush, making this medium-sized skimmer one of the more artistically marked dragonflies in the East.
dragonflyPill Millipede
A short, heavily armored millipede that rolls into a tight, perfect ball when disturbed, closely resembling a pill bug but built from far fewer, broader body segments.
myriapod
Northern Mole Cricket
A stout, velvety brown cricket with shovel-like front legs built for tunneling through damp soil, more often heard as a low buzzing trill at night than seen above ground.
grasshopper-cricket
Meadow Spittlebug
A small, mottled hopping true bug whose immature nymphs are far more often noticed than the adults, hidden inside frothy blobs of white foam known as cuckoo spit on plant stems.
true-bug
Lappet Moth
A large, richly textured moth with deeply scalloped, russet-brown wings that fold into an uncanny dead-leaf silhouette, one of the most convincing leaf mimics among European moths.
mothMayfly
A delicate insect with upright, sail-like wings and long, thread-thin tail filaments, famous for emerging by the millions in brief, synchronized swarms before dying within a day or two.
aquatic-insect
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.
butterflyGall Midge
A delicate, mosquito-like fly whose larvae trigger plants to grow strange, often colorful swellings called galls, each species usually tied to one particular host plant.
fly
Flame Skimmer
A blazing orange-red dragonfly of western waterways, the Flame Skimmer perches boldly on sunlit rocks and twigs, its amber-tinted wings glowing like embers in flight.
dragonfly
European Paper Wasp
A slender, orange-antennaed social wasp that builds small, open umbrella-shaped paper combs under eaves and ledges, now common well beyond its native European range.
waspLeaf Miner
Rather than chewing from the outside, a leaf miner larva tunnels between the upper and lower surfaces of a leaf, leaving behind pale, winding trails or blotches that trace its path as it feeds.
fly
Leaf-Footed Bug
A large, elongated brown true bug named for the flattened, leaf-shaped expansions on its hind legs, often found feeding on fruits, seeds, and vegetables in gardens and orchards.
true-bug
Flat-backed Millipede
A slow, armor-plated decomposer whose body segments flare into flat, wing-like keels, giving it a distinctly ribbed, tank-like silhouette compared to rounder millipedes.
myriapod
Green Bottle Fly
A brilliantly iridescent, metallic green fly frequently seen basking on sunny surfaces outdoors, easily recognized by its shining emerald body and quick, buzzing flight.
fly
Gypsy Moth Caterpillar
A hairy, mottled gray caterpillar marked with rows of paired blue and red dots down its back, notorious for periodic outbreak years that can strip entire forests bare.
caterpillar-larva
House Centipede
A fast, wiry arthropod with 15 pairs of extremely long, banded legs that make it look far bigger than its actual body size, often seen darting across bathroom or basement floors at night.
myriapodGiant Centipede
A long, fast-moving, many-legged predator with a hardened segmented body and a pair of venom-injecting claws behind the head that it uses to overpower prey far larger than itself.
myriapod
Formosan Subterranean Termite
A pale, aggressive subterranean termite native to East Asia that builds enormous colonies and can construct large above-ground carton nests in trees, walls, and structures.
other