Identify this bug

I live in the Pacific Northwest and have seen this type of critter in a couple of different houses. I have no idea what it is, can anyone help?

Picture

The ruler markings in that photograph are in millimeters. It’s approximately five millimeters long and has at least one leg per body segment plus a great many hairs. In person I can’t see as many details as are visible in the photo, it mostly just looks like a dark grain of rice with legs.

It usually appears overnight on the walls of my bedroom. I’ve never seen one in other areas of the house, but that’s quite possibly due to its size and color. (This one crawled off my desk and fell onto the carpet while I was attempting to photograph it. It was damn hard to find again.) They move slowly, if at all. This one hit a top speed of maybe 3cm in two seconds while I was chasing it around for a photo.

I see maybe half a dozen per year, usually during the winter. We have a healthy population of house spiders but rarely see any other insects indoors, so I suspect the spiders are doing a pretty good job of cleanup.

Anyone know what it is?

Pretty sure that’s the larvae of a varied carpet beetle. Wiki linky.

Yep. Though I take mine outside when I catch them.

Yup, that appears to be it. If they feed on natural textiles that explains why they mostly show up in my bedroom - yuck! Time to make sure my stored clothes are okay. If those little buggers have put holes in my wedding dress I will KILL them.

Thanks guys, ignorance successfully fought!

Does EWWWW count as a proper ID? :slight_smile: