Honey Bees vote on their home’s location by doing a “waggle dance” to sway the hive!
Books
Recommended by Paul Naftzger
All books can be purchased from Amazon via the links below. We do not carry them for sale ourselves, however we do own a copy of each book in the list.
Field Guide to Northeastern Longhorned Beetles (Coleoptera: Cerambycidae)
If you’re into beetles, check out the Cerambycidae family, better known as longhorned beetles. They’re a huge group in the insect world, with about 20,000 species already named around the globe and plenty more out there waiting to be found. You’ll spot them on every continent except Antarctica.
What makes these beetles cool is their big size, wild colors, and textured bodies, which actually help make them pretty easy to ID, even with around 1,100 species in North America (not counting Mexico). This guide plays off those traits to make spotting them straightforward for anyone interested.
It comes loaded with more than 600 color photos and covers 342 of the 344 known species and subspecies from northeastern North America. You’ll get the key details to tell them apart, plus info on where they live, when they’re active through the seasons, and what their larvae like to munch on.
Bumble Bees of North America: An Identification Guide (Princeton Field Guides)
Bumble Bees of North America is a comprehensive guide to North American bumble bees. It contains detailed illustrations, maps, diagrams and graphs of seasonal activity patterns, allowing you more accurately identify all 46 bumble bee species found in North America.
Dragonflies of the North Woods (Naturalist Series)
Dragonflies Of The North Woods is a comprehensive book about all 102 species of dragonflies in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Ontario. The book is filled with over 250 high quality pictures and over 30 illustrations. The detailed maps and latest survey data can help you accurately identify Dragonflies in North America.
Simon and Schuster's Guide to Insects
This book is an easy to use guide to 350 species of insects. It features over 1000 amazing full-color illustrations and detailed explainations of the anatomy, behavior, and habitat of these incredibly diverse creatures.
Field Guide to Grasshoppers, Katydids, and Crickets of the United States
A field guide to grasshoppers, katydids, and crickets in the United States and Canada, focusing on the order Orthoptera. It covers the biology, behavior, and ecological importance of these insects, which are abundant and serve as key food sources for various animals while also impacting agriculture. The guide includes identification aids, species profiles with details on distribution, ecology, and similar species, along with color photos, drawings, distribution maps, and sonograms of their sounds. It targets amateur naturalists, students, and professional biologists as a reference for identifying and studying these insects.
Kaufman Field Guide to Insects of North America
This book is a field guide to insects found in North America north of Mexico, providing information on their observable behaviors, life histories, and ecological roles. It employs a broad, accessible approach with engaging text that avoids technical jargon, focusing on common attention-grabbing species while covering all recognizable groups. The guide features more than 2,350 digitally enhanced photographs and serves as a comprehensive, compact resource for naturalists and anyone interested in the diversity of insects.
National Wildlife Federation Field Guide to Insects and Spiders & Related Species of North America
The book is an all-photographic field guide to North American insects, spiders, and related species, covering more than 940 species for identification by amateur and expert naturalists. It includes over 1,600 close-up color photographs along with text detailing each species’ range, habitat, life cycle, and behavior. Additional sections provide guidance on starting insect collections, creating arthropod gardens, keeping insects and spiders in captivity, and macro photography techniques, with a waterproof cover suited for outdoor use.
Dragonflies and Damselflies of Georgia and the Southeast
This book is a field guide to dragonflies and damselflies (odonates) in Georgia, detailing over 150 species that are also common in the U.S. Southeast north of Florida. It includes explanations of body parts, taxonomy, life cycles, habitats, conservation issues, and tips for observing and photographing these insects. Organized by odonate families such as spreadwings, darners, spiketails, and emeralds, it provides family overviews and individual species accounts covering appearance, identification features, distribution, habitats, life history, behavior, and conservation status. Supplementary materials offer suggestions for viewing spots in Georgia, endangerment listings, and seasonal date ranges, with more than 400 color photographs and quick guides including range maps and flight periods.
Dragonflies and Damselflies of Texas and the South-Central United States: Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico
This book is a field guide to dragonflies and damselflies of the south-central United States (Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico), covering 263 species (more than half of the North American total) and serving as a useful reference for identification across broader parts of the United States, Canada, and northeastern Mexico. It includes photographs of all 85 damselfly and 178 dragonfly species in the region, along with line drawings, identification keys, and detailed descriptions. Species accounts cover size, distribution, flight season, identification features, similar species, habitat, biology, and ecology, supported by range maps, discussions of habitats, zoogeography, seasonality, life history, and conservation, plus sections on external anatomy, studying/photographing these insects, an extensive bibliography, and further resources.
Beetles of Eastern North America
This book is a comprehensive full-color field guide to the beetles of eastern North America, covering 1,406 species across all 115 families found in the United States and Canada east of the Mississippi River. It is the first such in-depth, color-illustrated guide to the region in over forty years, featuring more than 1,500 color photographs and an illustrated key to common families. The text covers beetle anatomy, reproduction, development, natural history, behavior, conservation, and practical advice on finding, photographing, collecting, and rearing beetles. Species and family accounts provide concise details on identification, biology, geographic range, and collecting information, making it a key resource for amateur naturalists, photographers, students, and professional entomologists.