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.
Wandering Glider
One of the most widely traveled insects on Earth, this golden dragonfly rides high-altitude winds across oceans and continents, rarely landing as it forages endlessly on the wing.
dragonfly
House Ant
A small, dark brown to black ant that forages in loose trails along countertops and baseboards and releases a distinctive rotten-coconut smell when crushed.
ant
Armyworm Moth
A plain tan to reddish-brown moth whose caterpillars are famous for marching in large groups across fields, stripping grasses and grain crops as they move.
moth
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.
beetle
Goliath Beetle
One of the largest and heaviest beetles on Earth, a massive scarab with a bold pattern of black, white, and brown stripes across its shield-like body.
beetle
Honeybee
A fuzzy, golden-brown and black social bee that lives in large colonies, builds wax honeycomb, and is the primary managed pollinator of crops and wildflowers worldwide.
bee
Boll Weevil
A small, grayish-brown snout beetle with a long, curved rostrum, historically famous for its close feeding association with cotton flower buds and bolls.
beetle
Common House Mosquito
A slender, drab brown mosquito that emerges at dusk from catch basins and forgotten containers to fill neighborhoods with its familiar high-pitched whine.
fly
June Beetle
A stout, reddish-brown scarab beetle that emerges in late spring and early summer, famous for clumsily bumping into porch lights and window screens at night.
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
Great Spangled Fritillary
A large, robust orange butterfly with bold black markings above and a striking array of large silvery spangles on a tawny-brown underside, closely tied to woodland violets.
butterfly
Death Watch Beetle
A mottled brown wood-boring beetle famous for the faint ticking sound it taps out inside old timbers, once thought by superstitious listeners to be an omen of death.
beetle
Stone Centipede
A quick, flattened, reddish-brown centipede that darts for cover the instant its stone or log shelter is lifted, one of the most commonly seen centipedes in temperate gardens.
myriapod
Chinese Oak Silkmoth
A large, rust-brown silkmoth with prominent transparent eyespots on all four wings, native to oak forests of China and long cultivated there for coarse tussah silk production.
moth
Wax Moth
A plain grey-brown moth whose larvae tunnel through beeswax honeycomb, spinning silk webbing as they feed, making it a well-known pest of beekeeping operations.
moth
Cabbage Looper Moth
A drab mottled-brown moth best known for its pale green, looping caterpillar that arches its back like an inchworm while feeding on garden vegetables.
moth
Termite Swarmer
A dense, short-lived cloud of dark, equal-winged insects pouring from a crack in soil or wood, each one a would-be founder of a brand-new termite colony.
other
Yellow Dung Fly
A golden, densely furred fly whose bright males cluster on fresh cow pats in pastures, competing for mates while ambushing smaller insects drawn to the same spot.
fly
Polyphemus Moth Caterpillar
A plump, apple-green giant silk moth larva with rows of silvery spots that swells to the size of a large finger before spinning a papery brown cocoon.
caterpillar-larva
Giant Desert Hairy Scorpion
The largest scorpion in North America, a robust golden-brown giant covered in fine bristles that digs deep burrows in the desert sand and hunts after dark.
arachnid
Common Blue
A small, sun-loving butterfly whose males flash brilliant violet-blue wings while females wear warm brown with a scattering of orange spots.
butterfly
Red Wood Ant
A large woodland ant with a reddish-brown thorax and dark abdomen, famous for building towering dome-shaped mounds of pine needles and twigs in forest clearings.
ant
Little Wood-Satyr
A small, weak-flying brown butterfly with two prominent yellow-ringed eyespots on each wing, common along shaded woodland edges in late spring.
butterfly
Tsetse Fly
A stout grayish-brown fly of African woodlands whose rigid, forward-jutting proboscis and scissor-folded wings set it apart from any ordinary house fly.
fly