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.

Vietnamese Walking Stick

Vietnamese Walking Stick

A slender tropical stick insect popular in classrooms and terrariums, notable for females that can produce healthy offspring entirely on their own, without ever mating.

mantis-stick
Mourning Cloak

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
Oriental Cockroach

Oriental Cockroach

A dark, matte blackish-brown cockroach with short wings that do not cover the abdomen, especially in females, and a preference for cooler, damper hiding spots than most other common cockroaches.

other
Fall Armyworm

Fall Armyworm

A brownish-green caterpillar marked with a pale inverted "Y" on its head, notorious for rapid, large-scale outbreaks that devastate corn and other grass crops across the globe.

caterpillar-larva
Whitefly

Whitefly

A tiny, moth-like white insect that clusters on the undersides of leaves and bursts into a snowy cloud when the plant is disturbed. Despite the name, it is not a true fly but a sap-feeding relative of aphids and scale insects.

true-bug
Fall Webworm

Fall Webworm

A pale, hairy caterpillar that spins loose, messy silk webs enclosing entire leaf clusters at the tips of tree branches, becoming especially noticeable in late summer and fall.

caterpillar-larva
Water Flea

Water Flea

Despite the name, the water flea is not an insect at all but a tiny, jerky-swimming crustacean whose transparent body and single dark eye make it one of the most recognizable members of freshwater plankton.

other

Asian 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