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.
Green 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.
other
Green Grasshopper
A bright grass-green grasshopper with a rasping, sustained song, the common green grasshopper is one of the most familiar sounds of a European summer meadow.
grasshopper-cricket
Field Cricket
A stout, dark cricket whose loud, rhythmic chirping is one of the most familiar summer and fall night sounds in fields and lawns across much of the world.
grasshopper-cricket
Imperial Moth
One of the largest and most variably patterned silk moths in North America, with broad yellow wings mottled in shades of purple, brown, and pink, and a caterpillar that can grow to impressive size on a wide range of forest trees.
moth
Brimstone Butterfly
A sulphur-yellow, leaf-shaped butterfly whose folded wings mimic a fresh green leaf so convincingly it is often credited as the origin of the word 'butterfly'.
butterfly
Striped Bark Scorpion
A slender, tan scorpion marked with two bold dark stripes down its back, often found tucked under bark, rocks, or debris across the central United States.
arachnid
Bagworm Moth
A moth best known for its larva's habit of constructing and living inside a spindle-shaped case of silk and plant debris that hangs from twigs, with adult males a plain sooty-winged moth and females remaining wingless and grub-like inside the bag for life.
moth
Clouded Sulphur
A medium-sized pale yellow butterfly with crisp black wing borders, commonly seen fluttering low over clover fields and roadside meadows across North America.
butterfly
Armyworm
A striped, greenish-brown caterpillar that gets its name from its habit of migrating in dense, destructive groups across grass and grain fields.
caterpillar-larva
Eastern Comma
A ragged-edged orange-and-brown woodland butterfly named for the small, silvery comma-shaped mark on the underside of its hindwing, with a cryptic dead-leaf pattern that camouflages it perfectly when its wings are closed.
butterfly
Culex Mosquito
A large, worldwide genus of plain brown mosquitoes recognizable by their blunt abdomens and habit of resting flat against surfaces.
fly
Green Darner Dragonfly
One of the largest and most widespread dragonflies in North America, its green thorax and target-marked face make it unmistakable as it patrols open water on powerful wings.
dragonfly
Black Garden Ant
A familiar small, glossy black ant that forms visible foraging trails across patios and garden paths and nests beneath stones, pavers, and lawns.
ant
Earthworm
A long, smooth, segmented soil-dweller with no legs, eyes, or shell, best recognized by its ringed body and the pale saddle-like band (clitellum) found on mature individuals.
other
Furniture Beetle
A tiny, reddish-brown to dark brown cylindrical beetle whose larvae, commonly called 'woodworm,' bore small round tunnels through seasoned furniture and timber.
beetle
Comma Butterfly
An orange-brown butterfly with distinctively ragged, scalloped wing edges and a small white comma-shaped mark on the underside of the hindwing, resembling a dead leaf when at rest.
butterfly
Vaporer Moth
A tussock moth with dramatic sexual differences: the male is a small rusty-brown day-flying moth with a white wing spot, while the female is a flightless, wingless gray sac-like insect that never leaves her cocoon.
moth
Walking Stick
A remarkably twig-like insect with a long, slender, brown to green body and thin legs, so effective at mimicking a plant stem that it can be nearly invisible while motionless on vegetation.
mantis-stick
Northern Walkingstick
A slender, wingless insect so convincingly shaped like a twig that it can rest motionless on a branch just inches from view and go completely unnoticed.
mantis-stick
Bed Bug (Bat Bug)
A small, flat, reddish-brown, wingless true bug that hides in tight seams and crevices by day and feeds on blood at night, closely related to the bat bug, which occupies a similar niche in bat roosts.
true-bug
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
Chinch Bug
A tiny black-and-white true bug that feeds on grasses, often overlooked individually but capable of forming dense colonies in sunny, dry patches of lawn.
true-bug
Indian Stick Insect
A slender, twig-mimicking insect so unremarkable in stillness that it disappears among the stems it feeds on, one of the most widely raised stick insects in the world.
mantis-stick
African Mantis
A large, sturdy green or brown mantis frequently found perched on garden shrubs, patiently scanning for insect prey with its sharply angled triangular head.
mantis-stick