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.
Snail
A shelled land mollusk that carries a coiled, calcium-carbonate shell on its back and glides slowly across damp gardens and vegetation on a slime-lubricated foot.
otherMarsh Fly
A slender, unassuming fly best known for larvae with a remarkable diet: nearly every species in the family feeds on aquatic or terrestrial snails and slugs, making marsh flies natural specialists in wetland food webs. Adults are often found resting quietly on sedges and other marsh vegetation near the water's edge.
fly
Cicada
A stout, big-eyed insect best known for the loud, buzzing chorus of song produced by males, and for periodical species that emerge from the ground by the millions after living underground for over a decade.
true-bug
Slug
A soft-bodied, shell-less land mollusk that glides on a muscular foot, leaving a silvery mucus trail as it forages across damp ground and vegetation.
other
Cigarette Beetle
A tiny, reddish-brown, humpbacked beetle that rides along in stored dried herbs, spices, and tobacco wherever it hitches a ride.
beetle
Golden Silk Orb Weaver
Suspended in a massive, glinting web strung between trees along a forest trail, the golden silk orb weaver is one of the largest and most striking web-building spiders in the Americas, spinning silk with a distinctive yellow-gold sheen.
spider
Drugstore Beetle
A tiny brown beetle with grooved wing covers that once earned its name by burrowing into dried herbs and medicines kept on pharmacy shelves.
beetle
Indianmeal Moth
A small moth with two-toned, coppery-and-gray wings whose caterpillars spin silken webbing through stored grain, cereal, and dried fruit.
moth
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.
beetle
Fireflies Larvae Glowworm
The larval form of fireflies, often called glowworms, are flattened, segmented crawlers that glow with a steady greenish light. These little predators hunt slugs, snails, and worms in damp ground.
beetle
Clover Mite
A speck-sized reddish mite that streaks a rust-colored stain if crushed and invades homes by the hundreds when lawns dry out or turn cold.
arachnid
Flour Beetle
A tiny, shiny reddish-brown beetle that infests flour, cereal, and other dry stored foods, often found in dense clustered populations.
beetle
Blacklegged Tick
A tiny, teardrop-shaped tick with dark legs and a reddish-brown abdomen that lurks in leaf litter along woodland trails.
arachnid
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
Carrot Rust Fly
A slender, shiny black fly barely a few millimeters long whose slim yellowish larvae tunnel rust-colored trails through carrot and parsnip roots.
fly
Little Black Ant
A tiny, shiny jet-black ant that forms long, wandering foraging trails across lawns, patios, and kitchen counters in search of sweets and protein.
antHouse 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
Bagrada Bug
A tiny, orange-and-black stink bug with an intricate mottled pattern, notable as a small-bodied specialist pest of cabbage-family plants in warm, dry climates.
true-bug
Tiger Beetle
A fast, metallic-hued ground beetle with oversized sickle-shaped jaws that sprints and short-flies down open sandy trails in pursuit of tiny prey.
beetle
Brown Recluse Spider
A uniformly light-brown spider with a faint violin-shaped marking on its back and only six eyes instead of the usual eight, typically found hiding in dry, undisturbed indoor and outdoor spaces.
spiderDrywood Termite
A termite that lives entirely within the dry wood it feeds on, needing no soil contact at all, and revealing itself mainly through small piles of pellet-like frass pushed from tiny exit holes.
other
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
Indian Meal Moth
A small, distinctively two-toned moth with pale grey-tan inner wings and coppery-reddish outer wings, widely recognized as the most common moth found infesting stored dry food products in homes.
moth
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