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.
Scale Insect
A small, immobile insect that appears as a flat or domed, waxy bump firmly attached to a stem or leaf, easily mistaken for a plant blemish rather than a living creature.
true-bug
Cochineal
A tiny, sedentary scale insect that lives clustered on prickly pear cacti beneath a protective coat of white, waxy fluff, historically prized for the deep red pigment it produces.
true-bug
Spittlebug
A small hopping true bug best known in its nymph stage, which surrounds itself in a frothy mass of white foam on plant stems, commonly called cuckoo spit.
true-bug
Stonefly
A flattened, drab-winged insect whose nymphs are among the most reliable living indicators of pristine, well-oxygenated stream water.
aquatic-insect
Moth
A broad group of scale-winged insects related to butterflies, typically nocturnal, with stout, often furry bodies and feathery or thread-like antennae.
moth
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
Screwworm Fly
A metallic blue-green blowfly whose larvae are unusual among maggots for feeding on living tissue rather than carrion, drawn to even small open wounds on warm-blooded animals. The species has been the target of one of the most successful large-scale insect eradication campaigns in history across much of North America.
fly