“I have found two of these very, very small larvae in my bathtub after returning home from being away for four days”, writes Nicole about the yellow, worm-like critter pictured below. “As a backstory, I have two dogs and we recently (within the past month) moved into a new home that is old and under renovation. About three weeks ago I found a few fleas which I had thought I had completely eradicated. I washed my dogs with Dawn dish soap a few times that week, vacuumed extensively, laundered all of the linen in the house multiple times, spread diatomaceous earth under baseboards, carpets (and then rolled them up) and around certain spots the dogs like to lay, and had a company come to spray the yard with an organic solution (safe for pets and children). I hadn’t seen a sign of a flea in two weeks. I do also see a lot of other bugs making their way into the house; mainly just some ants and small black beetles. I’m really hoping these worms I found aren’t flea larvae, but I can’t seem to be sure what they are. They look almost to be a light pinkish color and if you zoom in on one of the photos, it looks like the larvae may have legs. I’m very confused and hoping you can help!”

“I found this bug in the crevices of a pair of hand-made gloves I have”, writes Lexi about the light brown-striped bug pictured below. “I found two within the gloves and both appeared dead (or at least not moving). I put those gloves in a plastic bag for now. I think they may be carpet beetle larvae but I’m not sure. The gloves have been in a wooden closet for a number of months along with some other winter things and jackets. I inspected everything that was on the same shelf as the gloves and found no other bugs in the other clothes (which were like scarfs and hats and hoodies). Regardless I threw what I could in the dryer and used a steamer on the rest. Do you think this is a carpet beetle larva? Or something else? What does it mean that I’ve only found dead ones on one piece of clothing and none (living or dead) on anything else. These gloves have been untouched in the closet for months, and even before that I did not wear them often. If they are carpet bugs, can the eggs live on surfaces like phones? How easy do eggs transfer from one surface to another, say by wearing a hat on your head? Thank you in advance!”

“What is this worm?” asks this reader about an organism she found. The organism in question appears to be black in color, with multiple hair-thin appendages spiking out from the sides of its body.

We are blessed to live in a world where fuzzy caterpillars exist. Looking like little bundles of fur, are these critters as utterly harmless as they appear to be, or are they hiding something far more sinister under their dazzling coats?

A reader wrote to us recently about a “worm/bug” he has been finding on his bed sheets for several days in a row. Upon zooming in on one of the photos our reader sent in, the creature in question appears to be ovate in shape, black and white in color (though given the image’s quality this is uncertain), and has bristles surrounding its body.

A woman recently contacted us with the following image of a bug she estimates to be about 1/4-inch or smaller. She found this creature on her couch, and from the picture we can see it is brown and tan striped in color, with a darker brown head at one of its ends.