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.
Tomato Hornworm
A large, thick green caterpillar with diagonal white stripes and a distinctive curved horn at its tail end, often found stripping leaves from tomato plants in gardens.
caterpillar-larva
Woolly Bear Caterpillar
A densely bristled caterpillar banded in black at both ends with a rusty-orange middle section, famous in folklore for supposedly predicting winter severity and for rolling into a tight ball when touched.
caterpillar-larvaCave Spider
A long-legged orb weaver adapted to the twilight zone of caves, spinning large webs across cavern mouths and dangling its egg sacs from silk threads deep within the darkness.
spider
Mealworm Beetle
A shiny, oval, dark reddish-brown to nearly black beetle whose larva, the familiar 'mealworm,' is a common sight in stored grain products.
beetleOnion Fly
A slender gray fly closely related to houseflies whose white legless larvae bore into onion bulbs, feeding in clusters within a single rotting bulb.
fly
Two-Spotted Stink Bug
A boldly patterned black-and-orange predatory stink bug named for the pair of dark spots on its back, best known for hunting Colorado potato beetle larvae in gardens and fields.
true-bugGrub Worm
A plump, C-shaped, creamy-white larva with a distinct brown head, living underground where it feeds on grass and plant roots before eventually maturing into a scarab beetle.
beetle
Carpet Beetle
A tiny, rounded beetle with a mottled scale pattern of white, brown, and yellow, whose bristly larvae are known for feeding on wool, fur, and other dried animal fibers indoors.
beetleGreen Lacewing
With delicate pale green wings and glittering golden eyes, the Green Lacewing is a familiar garden insect whose larvae are voracious predators of aphids and other soft-bodied pests.
otherIchneumon Wasp
A slender, long-antennaed parasitoid wasp, often mistaken for a giant mosquito or a stinging insect, that is best known for the extraordinarily long ovipositor some species use to drill into wood and lay eggs on hidden larvae.
wasp
Wolf Spiderling
A tiny, fast-moving juvenile wolf spider, often seen riding in dozens on its mother's back before dispersing to hunt on its own across open ground.
spider
Trichogramma Wasp
Barely larger than a speck of dust, the trichogramma wasp is one of the tiniest insects known. These minute parasitoids lay their eggs inside the eggs of moths and butterflies.
wasp
Powderpost Beetle
A small, slender reddish-brown to dark brown beetle whose larvae tunnel through seasoned hardwood, reducing it internally to a fine, powdery frass.
beetle
Antheraea Silkmoth
A large, robust silkmoth in the genus Antheraea with broad reddish-brown to tan wings, each marked with a prominent transparent, eye-like spot, representing a group of giant moths long valued for producing wild silk.
moth
Aphid Midge
A delicate, long-legged midge whose orange larvae are voracious aphid hunters. The aphid midge is a prized natural enemy of aphids in gardens and greenhouses.
flyWater Penny Beetle
A flattened, coin-shaped larva that clings almost invisibly to the surface of submerged stream rocks, named for its uncanny resemblance to a small penny.
aquatic-insect
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.
beetleSawfly
A wasp relative that never stings, best known for its caterpillar-like larvae that strip leaves from roses, pines, and other garden plants in tidy rows.
wasp
Fruit Fly (Mediterranean)
A small but strikingly patterned fly with mottled, banded wings held out to the sides in a fan and a body dotted with silvery spots, best known for larvae that tunnel through ripening fruit. Native to sub-Saharan Africa, it has spread with human trade to become one of the most widely recognized fruit-infesting insects in the world.
flyDung 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
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
Skipper Butterfly
A stocky, fast-darting butterfly with a large head, hooked antennae tips, and thick furry body, intermediate in appearance between butterflies and moths, named for its quick, skipping flight.
butterfly
Whitefringed Beetle
A stout gray-brown weevil named for the pale, fringe-like stripe along the outer edge of its wing covers, whose root-feeding larvae are a recognized issue in pastures and row crops.
beetle
Tarantula Hawk
One of the largest wasps in the world, with a glossy metallic blue-black body and vivid burnt-orange wings, famous for hunting tarantulas to provision a single underground burrow for its larva.
wasp