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.
Varied Carpet Beetle
A tiny beetle mottled with white, brown, and yellow scales that, as a fuzzy larva, quietly grazes on natural fibers tucked away in closets and attics.
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Mexican Bean Beetle
A copper-colored, spotted beetle resembling an overgrown ladybird that feeds on bean plant leaves along with its spiny yellow larvae.
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Asian Lady Beetle
A highly variable orange-to-red ladybird beetle, often bearing many black spots or none at all, famous for swarming into homes in large numbers during autumn.
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American Carrion Beetle
A broad, flattened black beetle with a striking pale yellow shield behind its head, commonly found on and around small animal carcasses where it feeds alongside fly larvae.
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Pine Sawyer Beetle
A large, long-antennaed longhorn beetle of pine and spruce forests, mottled gray-brown to black, that produces a rasping sound when handled and whose larvae tunnel deep into dead or dying conifer wood.
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Spotted Cucumber Beetle
A small, elongated yellow-green beetle marked with twelve black spots across its wing covers, commonly seen on cucurbit and corn plants throughout the growing season.
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Lily Leaf Beetle
A brilliant scarlet-red beetle with a jet-black head, legs, and underside that feeds almost exclusively on true lilies and fritillaries, often stripping leaves down to bare stems.
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Net-winged Beetle
A soft-bodied beetle with broad, ridged wing covers patterned in bold orange or red and black bands, whose netlike wing venation and vivid coloring warn potential predators of its unpalatability.
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Great Silver Water Beetle
One of the largest beetles in Europe, the great silver water beetle is a glossy jet-black giant that rows through weedy ponds carrying a silvery film of air trapped beneath its body.
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Ten-lined June Beetle
A large, brown scarab beetle marked with bold white racing stripes down its wing covers, known for its loud buzzing flight and hissing defensive squeak.
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Devil's Coach Horse Beetle
A large, matte-black rove beetle that raises its flexible abdomen up and over its back like a scorpion's tail and gapes its jaws when threatened, one of the biggest and most dramatic rove beetles in Europe.
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Metallic Wood-boring Beetle
The North American common name for jewel beetles, emphasizing the wood-tunneling habits of their larvae, which leave telltale flattened, D-shaped exit holes in bark of stressed or dying trees.
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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.
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Jagged Ambush Bug
A stocky, irregularly angular true bug camouflaged among flower petals, equipped with thickened, raptorial front legs it uses to seize visiting pollinators far larger than itself.
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Crab Spider
Perched motionless atop a flower petal, often perfectly matched to its color, the crab spider is a patient ambusher that waits for pollinators to land within reach of its outstretched front legs.
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Minute Pirate Bug
A tiny, black-and-white patterned true bug barely visible without close inspection, the minute pirate bug is a voracious predator of thrips, mites, and insect eggs on flowers and foliage.
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Hoverfly
A slender, bee- or wasp-patterned fly known for its remarkable ability to hover motionless in midair before darting suddenly to a new flower.
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Ambush Bug
A chunky, irregularly shaped true bug with thickened, raptorial front legs, the ambush bug hides motionless on flowers, blending into the petals while waiting to seize visiting pollinators.
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Orchid Mantis
A dazzling pink-and-white mantis whose petal-shaped leg lobes let it pass as a flower, luring pollinating insects close enough to ambush.
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Mediterranean Flour Moth
A small, pale grey moth with fine dark wavy lines on its forewings, whose larvae spin webbing through flour, grain, and other stored dry food products, making it a well-known pest of mills and pantries.
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Locust Borer
A slender black longhorn beetle boldly striped with yellow, closely resembling a wasp, commonly seen visiting goldenrod flowers in autumn near black locust trees.
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June Bug
A chunky, reddish-brown to nearly black scarab beetle that bumbles noisily around porch lights on warm late-spring and early-summer evenings.
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Ladybug
A small, round, brightly colored beetle with a domed, shiny shell typically red or orange with black spots, one of the most recognizable and beloved beetles found in gardens worldwide.
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Old House Borer
A grayish-brown to nearly black longhorn beetle whose larvae bore extensively through structural softwood, capable of causing large galleries hidden beneath the wood surface.
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