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.
Pharaoh Ant
A tiny, pale-yellow ant that thrives almost exclusively indoors, forming vast interconnected colonies within the warm voids of heated buildings.
ant
Comet Moth (Madagascan Moon Moth)
One of the largest and most spectacular silk moths in the world, with pale yellow-to-red wings and extraordinarily long, ribbon-like tails on the hindwings.
mothCave Cricket
Humpbacked and wingless with absurdly long legs and antennae, this pale, silent insect thrives in the total darkness of caves, basements, and damp crawl spaces.
grasshopper-cricket
Tiger Centipede
A large, banded desert centipede with alternating dark and pale segments reminiscent of tiger stripes, capable of a fast, muscular scuttle across sand and rock.
myriapodSnake Millipede
A slender, glossy, pale millipede that curls into a tight spiral when disturbed and often shows a faint row of reddish spots along its sides.
myriapod
Eastern Subterranean Termite
A pale, soft-bodied social insect that lives in vast underground colonies and builds mud tubes to reach and feed on wood cellulose, including structural timber.
otherBird Mite
A minute, pale to reddish mite that lives among feathers and nesting material of wild and domestic birds, sometimes dispersing into nearby buildings when nests are abandoned.
arachnid
Powdered Dancer
Named for the pale, frosty bloom that coats mature males, the Powdered Dancer is a robust river damselfly often seen basking on sunlit rocks and gravel bars.
dragonflyEastern Black Swallowtail Caterpillar
A striking green-and-black banded caterpillar dotted with yellow spots that flashes a bright orange forked horn when disturbed.
caterpillar-larva
Virginia Tiger Moth
An almost pure-white, fluffy tiger moth with a few small black dots on the wings and body, whose caterpillar is the familiar pale yellow "yellow woolly bear."
moth
Spring Azure
One of the earliest-flying small blue butterflies of spring, with soft pale-blue upperwings, a whitish gray underside dotted with faint dark markings, and no tails on the hindwing.
butterfly
Sac Spider
A pale, uniformly colored spider that spins a small silk sac retreat rather than a capture web, often found tucked into rolled leaves or corners of rooms.
spider
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.
butterfly
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
Deathstalker Scorpion
A slender, pale yellow scorpion of Middle Eastern and North African deserts, famed for its striking coloration and status as one of the most studied scorpions in scientific research.
arachnidSod Webworm
A dull, grayish-green caterpillar that hides in silk-lined burrows by day and emerges at night to chew grass blades down to the thatch.
caterpillar-larva
Autumn Meadowhawk
One of the last dragonflies still flying as autumn cools, this small pale-legged meadowhawk can be found sunning on trails and pond banks well into November in many areas.
dragonfly
House Cricket
A pale tan, dark-banded cricket originally from warm regions of Asia that has spread worldwide both as an occasional indoor nuisance and as a widely farmed feeder insect.
grasshopper-cricket
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
Cellar Spider
A pale, long-legged spider that builds loose, irregular webs in dark corners and is famous for rapidly vibrating in its web when disturbed, causing it to blur into an indistinct shape.
spider
Broad-Bodied Chaser
A stout, flat-bodied dragonfly that is often the first to colonise a new garden pond, with males showing a powdery pale blue abdomen and females a warm golden-brown one.
dragonflyBackswimmer
A boat-shaped aquatic true bug that swims upside down using oar-like hind legs, patrolling pond water in search of small prey.
aquatic-insect
Two-striped Grasshopper
Easily spotted by the pair of pale cream stripes running the length of its body, the two-striped grasshopper is one of the largest and most economically important grasshoppers in North America.
grasshopper-cricket
Silkworm
Plump, pale, and utterly dependent on humans, the silkworm is the domesticated caterpillar behind thousands of years of silk production, spinning a single continuous thread of silk to form its cocoon.
caterpillar-larva