At midday, surface temperatures in the desert often exceed 60°C. To be active at this time, animals need extraordinary behavioural or physiological adaptations. Desert ants, for instance, spend up to 75% of their foraging time cooling down on elevated thermal refuges such as grass stalks. Ball-rolling dung beetles work under similar thermal conditions in South African savannahs. After landing a...

To escape competition at the dung pile, a ball-rolling dung beetle forms a piece of dung into a ball and rolls it away. To ensure their efficient escape from the dung pile, beetles rely on a 'celestial compass' to move along a straight path. Here, we analyzed the reliability of different skylight cues for this compass and found that dung beetles rely not only on the sun but also on the skylight...

To determine if dung from various species of native mammals are attractive to species of Scarabaeidae differentially in a seasonal evergreen forest in Thailand, we used pitfall traps baited with fresh dung of four species (barking deer, sambar deer, Asian elephant, pig-tailed macaque) and an unbaited control. The pitfalls were deployed in Khao Yai National Park for 24 hours in March 2010. All t...

The overabundance of large herbivores is now recognized as a serious ecological problem. However, the resulting ecological consequences remain poorly understood. The ecological effects of an increase in sika deer, Cervus nippon Temminck (Cervidae), on three insect groups of beetles was investigated: ground beetles (Carabidae), carrion beetles (Silphidae), and dung beetles (Scarabaeidae and Geot...

Avermectins and milbemycins are commonly used in agro-ecosystems for the control of parasites in domestic livestock. As integral members of agro-ecosystems with importance in maintaining pasture health through dung burial behaviour, dung beetles are an excellent nontarget bio-indicator taxon for examining potential detrimental effects of pesticide application. The current review focuses on the ...

Insects feeding on plant sap, blood, and other nutritionally incomplete diets are typically associated with mutualistic bacteria that supplement missing nutrients. Herbivorous mammal dung contains more than 86% cellulose and lacks amino acids essential for insect development and reproduction. Yet one of the most ecologically necessary and evolutionarily successful groups of beetles, the dung be...

Madagascar has a rich fauna of dung beetles (Scarabaeinae and Aphodiinae) withalmost 300 species described to date. Like most other taxa in Madagascar, dung beetles exhibit an exceptionally high level of endemism (96% of the species). Here,we review the current knowledge of the origin and diversification of Malagasy dung beetles. Based on molecular phylogenies, the extant dung beetles originate...

When the moon is absent from the night sky, stars remain as celestial visual cues. Nonetheless, only birds, seals, and humans are known to use stars for orientation. African ball-rolling dung beetles exploit the sun, the moon, and the celestial polarization pattern to move along straight paths, away from the intense competition at the dung pile. Even on clear moonless nights, many beetles still...

Endothermy in insects is normally associated with flight but has been observed during strictly terrestrial activity in beetles (Bartholomew & Casey 1977a, b). A study by Bartholomew & Heinrich (1978) in Kenya showed that dung beetles are conspicuously endothermic during flight, ball making and ball rolling, and sometimes while walking. Endothermy during terrestrial activity is probably advantag...