Dung Beetle
cwilcox | March 15, 2009Yeah, I know I'm lucky. While most of my readers are struggling to shovel the snow out of their driveways, I'm enjoying yet another weekend of 80 degree heat and lovely sun. So it only seems right to take advantage of the good weather and hit the outdoors.
So, on Saturday, Barry and I visited Historic Spanish Point. It's a local historical/archaeological site in Sarasota, FL. The site covers prehistoric human activity all the way to colonial gardening - and it is beautiful. There are a variety of flowers and other plants all around you. My personal favorite area was the butterfly garden,…
edyong | January 21, 2009If the sound of eating dung all your life doesn't sound that appealing to you, you're not alone. A beetle called Deltochilum valgum shares your distaste, which is quite surprising given that it's a dung beetle.
There are over 5,000 species of dung beetle and almost all of them feed mainly on the droppings of other animals (and more specifically, on the rich supply of bacteria they contain). D.valgum is the black sheep of the family, the only one that has abandoned the manure-based diet of its fellows and taken to hunting live meat for a living.
D.valgum lives in the lowland rainforests of…
grrlscientist | January 2, 2008tags: dung beetle, insects, National Geographic, Image of the Day
Dung beetle.
Racing to complete a day's work, a dung beetle loses control of its prize possession on the tar road that runs through Kruger National Park, South Africa.
Image: Scott Francis 2007 (photo appears here with permission by National Geographic). [larger view].