Photo Credits

Our identification pages use real photos that are in the public domain or released under Creative Commons licenses that allow reuse. We crop and resize photos to fit the page; Creative Commons photos are credited with the photographer, license and source. Cartoon illustrations elsewhere on the site are made for BugWise with AI image tools and are not photos.

  • Adult bed bug seen from above on fabric: a flat, oval, reddish-brown insect with six legs and short antennae. Photo: Katja Schulz, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Brown recluse spider on a gray surface: a plain light-brown spider with a small body and long, thin, uniformly colored legs. Photo: iamfindingplants, CC0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Eastern carpenter bee on yellow goldenrod flowers: a large black bee with a fuzzy yellow thorax and a shiny black abdomen. Photo: Erik Schiff, CC0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Adult varied carpet beetle seen from the side: a tiny rounded beetle covered in a mottled pattern of white, brown and black scales. Photo: Gilles San Martin, CC BY-SA 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Drain fly (moth fly) resting on a leaf: a tiny fuzzy fly with broad, hairy, leaf-shaped wings. Photo: Katja Schulz, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Adult cat flea seen from the side: a tiny reddish-amber insect with a body flattened side to side and long hind legs. Photo: Justin Williams, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Winged ant seen from the side, showing a narrow pinched waist, elbowed antennae and long clear wings. Photo: USGS Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab from Beltsville, Maryland, USA, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons, resized.
  • Fruit fly on a yellow surface beside a 1 mm scale bar: a tan fly with bright red eyes and a darker banded abdomen. Photo: Jesse Rorabaugh, CC0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Fungus gnat on soil seen from the side: a small, slender fly with a dark head, an orange-brown abdomen, long legs and clear wings. Photo: Toby, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • German cockroach on a plain surface: a small, light brown cockroach with long antennae and spiny legs. Photo: 0959kedi, CC0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • House mouse: a small gray-brown mouse with large ears, dark eyes and a long, thin tail. Photo: Justin, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Asian tiger mosquito on a white surface: a black mosquito with bright white stripes on its legs and body. Photo: Rafael Carbonell Font, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Odorous house ant worker walking on a leaf: a small, dark brown to black ant. Photo: JJ Harrison (https://www.jjharrison.com.au/), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons, resized.
  • Silverfish seen from above: a flat, carrot-shaped, silvery-gray insect with long antennae and three tail bristles. Photo: Christian Fischer, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons, resized.
  • Brown marmorated stink bug seen from above: a shield-shaped, mottled brown bug with light bands on its antennae. Photo: USGS Native Bee Inventory and Monitoring Laboratory from Beltsville, USA, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons, resized.
  • Eastern subterranean termites on wood: a pale, soft-bodied worker and a soldier with an orange-brown head and long jaws. Photo: Sam Kieschnick, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Adult female American dog tick seen from above: a brown tick with an ornate grayish-white shield behind the mouthparts. Photo: Benjamin Smith from United States, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons, resized.
  • Adult female blacklegged (deer) tick seen from above: a reddish-brown body with a dark shield behind the mouthparts and eight legs. Photo: Christian Back, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.
  • Adult female lone star tick seen from above: a reddish-brown tick with a single white spot in the middle of its back. Photo: Sam Droege, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons, resized.
  • Wolf spider seen from above: a hairy brown spider with darker and lighter stripes running down its body and thick legs. Photo: Tyler Bishop, CC BY 4.0, via iNaturalist, resized.